


a 




H 
I 



. VPaI 



■ 



■ 








■ 







■ 






^H 






THE KEYS OF SECT; 



CHURCH OF THE NEW TESTAMENT 



COMPARED WITH THE 



SECTS OF MODERN CHRISTENDOM. 



-^ 



t'1- / ™ 

JULIAN M. STURTEVANT, D. D., LL. D., 

3X-PRESIDENT OF ILLINOIS COLLEGE, AND AUTHOR OF " ECONOMICS, OR THE 
SCIENCE OF WEALTH." 



^ '■ OF 

c oPYRJG/yf . 

,, 18*9. 
BOSTON : 
LEE & SHEPARD, PUBLISHERS. 

NEW YORK : 

CHARLES T. DILLINGHAM. 

1880. 



T 






Copyright, 1879, 
BY JULIAN M. STURTEVANT. 



EJectrotyped and printed 

BY ALFRED MUDGE AND SON s BOSTON, 



PREFACE. 



Few words are needful to be said, in introducing the 
following work to the public. It embodies in this small 
compass the mature results of the thinking of a large por- 
tion of my life. It is but just to myself to say, that the 
subject was never chosen with any deliberate purpose, to be 
investigated as the theme of a book. I have not studied it 
because I wished to write a book, but I have written a book, 
because this subject seemed forced upon my attention by 
the irresistible providence of God, in connection with my 
appointed work as a Christian minister and an educator ; and 
because the results to which my mind has been brought by 
these lessons of experience seem to me worthy of the very 
serious consideration of the Christian public. 

I am not unaware of the boldness, perhaps some would 
think it more appropriate to say the temerity, of some of 
the positions which I have felt constrained to defend in this 
treatise, — constrained, not by any considerations of mere 
expediency, but by a profound conviction of their truth and 
importance. I entreat the reader to bear in mind that, as in 
the diseases of the body, so in those of society, it .is some- 
times necessary to apply heroic remedies, and courageously 
to resort to the knife of the surgeon. I regard that social 
disease against which the argument of this book is directed 
as being undoubtedly of this character. It seems to me, all 
intelligent, devout men must agree with me in saying, that 
that sectarian constitution of the Church which, in these 
pages, I have sought to lay bare to the view of all Chris- 



IV PREFACE. 

tians, is presenting itself at the present time in many shock- 
ing and alarming aspects, and we should not shrink from the 
application of any remedies which may be suggested by the 
devout study of the Word of God. The subject is weighty 
and important enough to enlist the prayerful and candid 
consideration of every Christian scholar and thinker. The 
appeal is not at all to any of the sectarian passions and 
prejudices of the hour, but to the Word of God only. 

There are men in many of those religious bodies that now 
divide Christendom, who are thoroughly convinced that the 
sect system which is now so prevalent, is contradictory to 
the spirit of Christianity, and who are looking and praying 
for deliverance from this bondage. My appeal is to them, 
in whatever sect found. I may not have solved the problem ; 
but I entertain a cheerful hope that I shall not be found to 
have failed in quickening thought on this momentous sub- 
ject, and in making some suggestions which will lead other 
minds along, a few steps at least, towards the desired solu- 
tion. It is this hope that has encouraged me to offer this 
work to the public, in the midst of many misgivings and 
some sickness at heart. Consistently with my sense of duty 
I cannot do otherwise. 

My final appeal is to Jesus Christ our Lord, who founded 
the Church, and gave assurance that the gates of hell shall 
never prevail against it. If this book sets forth a true con- 
ception of that moral kingdom which He came to found, it 
will be acceptable to Him, and He will secure for it its proper 
influence in the great conflicts of the present and the future. 
My humble effort will not lose its reward. 

J. M. S. 
Jacksonville, III., Nov. i, 1879. 



CONTENTS 



Part I. — The Church of the New Testament. 



Chap. 

I. 

II. 

III. 

IV. 

V. 

VI. 



The Question stated . 
The Perpetual Theocracy 
The Perpetual Passover . 
The Primacy of Peter 
The Perpetual Succession 
The Holy Catholic Church 



Page 

I 

16 

35 
53 
7* 
84 



Chai 



I. 

II. 

III. 

IV. 



Part II. — The Transition Church. 

The Rise of Hierarchy 121 

Hierarchy in its Maturity . . . ■ 160 

The Reformation 189 

Religious Liberty 209 



Part III. — The Church of Modern Christendom. 



Chap. 

I. The Origin of Modern Sects 

II. Apologies for Sect 

III. Sect Antichristian 

IV. What is the Remedy? 
V. Church Discipline 

VI. Other Objections considered 

VII. Congregationalism 

VIII. The Church of the Future 



223 

246 

264 

290 

3 r 5 

336 

3^f 

394 



THE KEYS OF SECT. 



PART I 



THE CHURCH OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 



CHAPTER I. 

THE QUESTION STATED. 

It will be conceded by all persons who have reflected 
sufficiently on the subject to form an opinion, that 
Jesus of Nazareth is represented in our gospels to have 
proposed to found a peculiar and perpetual society, 
which he sometimes called the church, 1 but more com- 
monly the kingdom of God or kingdom of heaven; 2 
and that he claimed that it was predicted in ancient 
prophecy that the Messiah should found such a society, 
insomuch that the assertion " The kingdom of heaven 
is at hand " was understood in the language of the 
time to mean that the Messiah was about to appear. 

There is an equally universal agreement that the 
unique society now bearing the name of the Christian 
Church did originate in Palestine, almost synchronously 

1 Matt, xvi: iS, 19. 

2 The identity of the "church "and the "kingdom of heaven" 
is here assumed. For proof of this, the reader is referred to Part 
I., chap. iv. 



2 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

with the crucifixion and alleged resurrection of Jesus, 
and that it was founded by men who represented them- 
selves as his emissaries or apostles, acting in his name 
and by his authority. This will be conceded alike by 
Christians of all shades of opinion, and by unbelievers 
who reject the moral authority both of the church and 
of its founder. It will also be conceded by all Chris- 
tians, that the church owes its whole moral authority 
to that same Jesus who was crucified under Pontius 
Pilate, whom his disciples represented to have risen 
from the dead, and that no doctrines or institutions of 
the church can have any claim to the moral allegiance 
of mankind, which cannot be shown to have originated 
in his teachings. 

But questions of great gravity require our attention. 
What was the constitution of the church which Jesus 
founded? With what powers did he invest it? Or 
still more fundamentally, on what forces did he rely for 
its government, its enlargement, its perpetuity? In 
relation to such questions as these, Christian people are 
by no means united. Conceptions are widely prevalent 
and have existed for ages, which are exceedingly diverse 
and contradictory to each other. They exist not only 
in the thoughts of men, and as matter of opinion, but 
in corresponding forms of organization and government, 
some of them indeed of comparatively recent origin, 
others that have come down to us from antiquity. 
That church which claims to represent the kingdom 
of heaven which Jesus founded is not one but many, 
each with its own distinct constitution, government 
and laws, and each standing in presence of every other 
in sharp and conscious rivalry, seeking to extend its 
jurisdiction over the greatest possible number of sub- 
jects. Yet the Christian church is an exceedingly im- 
portant element of the social life of every nation in 



THE QUESTION STATED. 3 

Christendom, and all Christian men trace the origin of 
that church which they recognize as truly representing 
the- society which Jesus founded, to his crucifixion and 
resurrection. In no other respect does modern Chris- 
tendom present such an aspect of confusion and 
anarchy as in this. On no one subject is opinion so 
various and contradictory, as in respect to the place 
which the church should occupy in the adjustment of 
social forces, the powers with which it is invested, and 
the constitution under which these powers are to be 
exerted. Must these conflicts be perpetual ? Must 
Christendom forever present this aspect of confusion 
and self-contradiction ? Must a large portion of its 
energies still be expended in these mutual rivalries, 
which might otherwise be employed in co-operative 
effort for the benefit of mankind ? Must Christian 
nations which ought to be united in the bonds of a 
religious brotherhood, be separated from each other 
still, by sharp antipathies growing out of contradictory 
systems of church government ? Can the conception 
of Jesus never be understood, and applied to the con- 
stitution of the whole church of God ? 

As we stand in the presence of these solemn ques- 
tions, there are many who are ready to answer without 
a moment's hesitation, that this conflict of opinion is 
so wide-spread and complicated, and so intimately 
interwoven with the life of Christianity in all its ages, 
that any remedy of this state of things is quite hope- 
less ; that it evidently results from some deep and 
permanent relation of Christianity, and indeed of all 
religion, to human nature itself, which renders it inevi- 
table ; that in this respect what is and has been must 
still be in all the future. Many persons are so entirely 
sure that this view of the subject is sound and true, 
that they regard the manifestation of a disposition to 



4 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

treat this state of things as though it were an evil 
capable of being remedied, as the sure indication of a 
mind unsound and incapable of forming a sober judg- 
ment on this or on any other subject. If they are 
believers in Christianity as a religion of supernatural 
origin, their theory of the case is that whatever of evil 
there is in this conflict of opinion is offset by many 
beneficial influences, and is at all events incurable ; 
and that our wisdom is to accept the present order of 
things as the best condition of Christendom which, 
human nature remaining as it is, is attainable , and 
mitigate the evils which proceed from it as much as we 
can by mutual forbearance and charity. If they are 
unbelievers, they are entirely confident that this con- 
flict of opinion and organization is a fatal objection to 
Christianity itself, and must at no distant day bring it 
into general neglect and contempt. 

This view of the matter, whether as held by the 
believer or unbeliever, seems to me rash, hasty and 
superficial. There may be apparent wisdom in assert- 
ing that if Jesus' conception of the kingdom of heaven, 
after the lapse of more than eighteen centuries, is not 
yet understood by his followers, there is no hope that 
it ever will be. But it is only apparent, not real. Such 
an assertion leaves out of the account the fundamental 
fact in the case. If God has sent to this world such a 
messenger as Jesus claimed to be, our short-sighted 
philosophy is quite inadequate to determine, how many 
ages must elapse, before the world will be prepared 
fully to appreciate either the messenger or the message. 
What John says of the Xoyog has been eminently verified 
in respect to Jesus. "The light shineth in the dark- 
ness ; and the darkness comprehended it not." 1 The 

1 John i : 5. 



THE QUESTION STATED. 5 

world has always been slow to appreciate its greatest 
minds. Their grand conceptions and penetrating in- 
sight have almost always surpassed the mental capacity 
of their contemporaries, and their great reputation has 
been for the most part posthumous. 

Of no one that ever lived among men was this so 
eminently true as of Jesus. This must necessarily 
have been so. The age of Julius Caesar and Augustus 
could not appreciate the blessedness of meekness. An 
age only accustomed to the iron rule of Rome could 
not appreciate a kingdom ruled by moral forces. Such 
a social and moral system as he conceived of and pro- 
posed to establish in the world can be appreciated 
only in proportion as it becomes an actual reality. 
For example, it would be easy to show that in the time 
of the prophet Daniel, there was no language in which 
the Messianic kingdom could be foretold, otherwise 
than by symbols derived from the previous history of 
the world and its then existing condition, and that 
such symbols could only express it very inadequately. 
Nobody in that age could have formed, certainly no 
one could have expressed, that conception of it which 
we have in the present age. For the same reason the 
disciples had great difficulty in understanding Jesus, 
when he spoke as plainly as was then possible, of the 
future of his kingdom. If the disciples themselves, 
with all the advantage of personal intercourse with 
him which they enjoyed, experienced this difficulty, 
how much more must other men in that age have failed 
to understand him. If this impossibility of full appre- 
ciation existed in Jewish minds, trained for generations 
and ages under the influence of the prophets that fore- 
told his coming, how much greater the difficulty must 
have been in the other nations, that had been subjected 
to no such discipline. Yet let it be borne in mind 



6 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

that, in the lifetime of the apostles, Christianity wad 
propagated from Jerusalem to Rome, and over all the 
region between. In a little more than two centuries 
from the death of the last of the apostles, its triumph 
was complete over all the Roman Empire. Nothing 
can be more manifest than that the immense masses 
who, in the progress of that mighty revolution, renounced 
paganism and embraced Christianity, could have had 
but a very imperfect appreciation of Jesus' conception 
of the kingdom of heaven. That all these millions 
should have become able to comprehend a system so 
refined and spiritual would have been as miraculous 
as the raising of Lazarus, or the resurrection of Jesus. 
Miracles indeed, when wrought, may impress men with 
a sense of divine presence and majesty, and that is 
what they are designed to do ; but they have no power 
at all to work such mighty intellectual and moral 
changes in the minds of men. These can be produced 
only by experience, and teaching Providence. It was 
not in omnipotence to have qualified the men of those 
ages to appreciate Jesus' conception of the Messianic 
kingdom. 

It is therefore not only credible, that the men who 
composed the church in the first three centuries might 
not have understood Jesus' conception, but capable of 
demonstration that they could not have understood it. 
From the very nature of the case, it is certain that, in 
constructing the church as an organism, they were 
likely to be guided, not by a clear understanding of 
the thought of the founder, but by ideas with which 
they had been familiar from childhood, and had inher- 
ited from immemorial ages of paganism. Nothing 
then is more absurd and preposterous than to expect 
to find, in the centuries immediately succeeding the 
apostolic age, a full and complete embodiment of Jesus' 



THE QUESTION STATED. 7 

conception of the kingdom. It is to look for it where 
we might know it could not have existed. The apostles 
themselves had come at last with immense difficulty 
to understand the Master. It was therefore to be 
presumed, that the churches planted under their imme- 
diate superintendence would at the outset be conform- 
able to the model; but it was to be expected that, as 
soon as the apostles were gone, organic changes would 
gradually occur, and that the churches would more and 
more conform to ideas which were of Roman and not 
of Christian origin. The best that could be hoped for 
was, that the influence of Jesus the crucified and risen 
Christ, would gain a foothold in all the regions over 
which the church extended, and gradually exert its 
reforming power; and that, after how many ages of 
providential teaching none can tell, a time would come, 
when the divine conception of the kingdo > of heaven 
could be appreciated by the whole multitude of the 
disciples. It is therefore no cause of wonder, no 
valid objection against Christianity, no ground of dis- 
couragement in respect to the future, that the thought 
of Jesus has been imperfectly understood for eighteen 
centuries, and that the practical attempts to embody 
it in organization which exist in this age present a 
strange scene of disorder and contradiction. Jesus of 
Nazareth is not yet appreciated. 

There are many indications that there existed in the 
minds of Jesus and his apostles a sorrowful apprehen- 
sion, that such a departure from the divine conception 
was soon to occur. Jesus himself distinctly predicted 
it. 1 It is evident that Paul wrote his Second Epistle 
to the Thessalonians under a painful foreboding that 
such an event was near at hand. 2 It is not my purpose to 

1 Matt, xxiv: 10-12, 24. 2 2 Thes. ii: 1-12. 



» THE KEYS OF SECT. 

enter on any interpretation of the language and imagery 
which he employs. It is not necessary to the purpose 
I have in view to do so. It is evident upon the very 
face of the passage in question, that he meant to 
express a grave apprehension of a great falling away 
from Christ, as soon about to happen. He even de- 
clares that the beginnings of it were already apparent. 
"For the mystery of iniquity doth already work." He 
writes as if discerning the present workings of those 
tendencies to evil which have been pointed out in the 
previous paragraphs as existing in that age, and the 
prospect cast a shade of gloom over his usually joyous 
spirit. He alludes with more or less distinctness to 
the same subject in other epistles. Similar apprehen- 
sions are indicated by John in his first epistle. 1 The 
same shadow falls deeply on the whole vision at Patmos. 
It is evident then, that this whole field of inquiry 
presents but a single question which is really worthy 
of any serious consideration. Is it possible to obtain any 
dear, definite and certaifi understanding of Jesus' concep- 
tion of the kingdom of heaven ? If not, all our investi- 
gations will be vain and profitless. There is but one 
element of order which can be cast, like a nucleus of 
crystallization, into this fermenting mass of conflicting 
thought and opinion. That element is such a defini- 
tion of the original thought of Jesus, according to 
which the church was founded, as can be understood 
by any inquiring mind, and substantiated by valid 
argument. If such a definition can be clearly evolved 
and soundly vindicated from the apostolic records of 
Jesus, it will sooner or later meet the universal accept- 
ance of all his followers. It would by no means be a 
thing to be expected that such an acceptance of it 

1 I John ii : 18, 19. 



THE QUESTION STATED. 9 

would be ready and immediate. Experience does not 
justify us in expecting, that in this world any great 
social and moral reforms can be so easily accomplished. 
Neither economic nor political truth is ever received 
as soon as it is propounded. It is almost invariably at 
first resisted, and is only received and incorporated 
into the laws and organizations of the world after long 
conflict, often extending through successive genera- 
tions. But received it will be, if it is truth, however 
long the conflict. 

In the present instance it must be borne in mind, 
that those forms of religious organization which are 
most widely prevalent in Christendom, are the very 
forms which grew up in the first six centuries succeed- 
ing the apostolic age, and that their adherents assume, 
with no small degree of confidence, that the very fact 
that they can trace back their history to that early 
time is itself a convincing proof of their right to exer- 
cise authority over all the Lord's people. They are 
rooted deeply in the venerable usages of many ages, 
and cannot be expected therefore readily to yield to 
any argument which calls in question their fundamental 
principles. Other forms of organization now exist 
which arc of much more recent origin, but they have 
for the most part been developed by various causes 
from the historic churches of the middle and earlier 
ages. It is therefore difficult for us to assure our- 
selves that, in separating themselves from those churches, 
they have not brought along with them organic prin- 
ciples of great importance, which did not originate in 
the thought of the Founder. It is not to be expected 
that the conception of Jesus can be clearly evolved, 
and applied to all forms of organization now existing 
in Christendom, without calling in question organic 
principles widely prevalent, and received with undoubt- 



IO THE KEYS OF SECT. 

ing faith by men of nearly every creed, and perhaps 
accepting nearly every form of church order. If any 
one therefore natters himself, that a clear and defensi- 
ble exhibition of Jesus' conception of the kingdom of 
heaven would meet with a ready and unresisted recep- 
tion from the whole body of the faithful, he is certainly 
greatly mistaken. I certainly have undertaken the work 
I have in hand with no such chimerical expectations. 

But there are minds that are prepared to receive 
such an exhibition of the subject, — prepared I would 
hope to welcome any devout and earnest attempt to 
make such an exhibition, — men who will lay hold of any 
truth which may be evolved by such a discussion, 
with such firmness of grasp as will insure its proper 
influence on the church of the future. Those men, 
whether believers or unbelievers, who think that the 
struggles of Christianity during these eighteen centuries 
have been profitless, are certainly deceived. The world 
is not so dark as it was when the stone was cut out of 
the mountain without hands. The kingdom of heaven, 
imperfectly as it has been understood, has been all 
along a light in the world, shining from age to age 
more and more brightly. It is possible now to under- 
stand the Messianic kingdom both morally and organ- 
ically, as it was not when it began its career in the 
world. The apostles had great difficulty in understand- 
ing how it was possible that Jesus could be the Messiah, 
and yet die and leave the world, without restoring the 
kingdom again to Israel. From the higher stand-point 
which we have gained, we wonder at their blindness. 
Is it not possible in this age for the masses to under- 
stand a kingdom that is not of this world, — a king- 
dom of righteousness, governed only by moral forces ? 

It is plain therefore that the question before us is 
one and simple. What is the nature and organic con- 



THE QUESTION STATED. II 

stitution of the kingdom of heaven which Jesus founded? 
It is not a question of "endless genealogies." I have 
not undertaken the task of tracing the pedigree of the 
religious organizations of the present, to ascertain 
which can fix its date farthest back in the centuries of 
darkness, conflict and gloom which succeeded the 
Christian era. All this is nothing and worse than 
nothing to the purpose. We should lose our labor, if 
we should prove that our favorite ideas of the church 
were received in the very first century after the apos- 
tolic age. Paul saw, in the apostolic age, the mystery 
of iniquity already working. It is highly probable from 
the nature of the case, that ideas widely divergent from 
those of Jesus the Christ gained much prevalence and 
acceptance within the first century after the apostles. 
That age could not appreciate Jesus. The only ques- 
tion worth a moment's thought is, — What was his con- 
ception ? Our answer to this question must come from 
his own words and deeds. Of these his apostles were 
competent witnesses, only because he had qualified 
them to be so by his own personal teaching and by the 
aid of his spirit. No subsequent age is competent to 
appear in court at the trial of this question. If Jesus 
has intelligibly expressed in words, or indicated by acts 
his conception, we can know what it was If he has not, 
the question is involved in a mystery which no investi- 
gation can penetrate 

It is not however practicable or desirable, to view 
this question under exactly the same aspects which it 
presented to those who were contemporary with Jesus. 
It is not a question of mere curiosity, but a practical 
question we are called to consider. We are surrounded 
by forms of thought and organization, each of which 
claims to be an embodiment of the original conception 
of the Founder We have need therefore to consider 



12 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

the question in its relations to the interpretations which 
have been put upon the conception of Jesus, and the 
forms of organization in which those interpretations are 
embodied. The subject must be viewed from the stand- 
point of the present time. If one would conduct an 
inquiry in relation to the supernatural origin. of Chris- 
tianity, in such- a manner as to exert any beneficial 
influence on the thinking of the present age, the subject 
must be viewed, not alone from the stand-point of the 
Christian era, but also from the stand-point of the 
present time ; not chiefly in view of the objections 
raised against it by scribes and Pharisees eighteen 
centuries ago, but especially in view of those forms of 
unbelief that are now prevalent. Indeed this necessity 
is universal. If one would enlarge the boundaries of 
knowledge in any department, he must prepare himself 
for his work by a full appreciation of the present condi- 
tion of knowledge in that department. He must appre- 
ciate the labors of those who have gone before him. 
He must ascertain the boundaries of their knowledge, 
and distinctly propound the questions which remain 
yet to be answered. With clear insight he must take 
his stand on the boundary which divides the known 
from the unknown, and lead the way into the unex- 
plored regions that lie beyond, guided by the light shed 
upon those regions from that which is already known. 
This principle holds in full force in respect to the 
question I propose to investigate. The conflicts of 
eighteen centuries, in respect to the nature and constitu- 
tion of the Christian church have been full of instruction. 
He who would assist us to a better understanding of 
the original conception must avail himself of all the 
light which has been shed on the question by the expe- 
rience of all these Christian centuries. He must appre- 
ciate the present, or he cannot be its instructor. It is 



THE QUESTION STATED. 1 3 

only by availing ourselves of all the lessons of the past 
and the present, that we can have any reason to hope 
that we shall be able to understand the conception of 
Jesus more perfectly than those who have gone before 
us. In treating the question under consideration, we 
shall therefore be constantly concerned with the under- 
lying principles of the organizations which now exist, 
and with those which have existed in the past ages of 
Christian history. On all subjects, God teaches man- 
kind by experience, and in nothing more than in respect 
to religious truth. It is not too much to affirm that, 
consistently with the nature of the human mind, relig- 
ious truth cannot be taught otherwise. The whole 
history of Christianity is to be regarded as one long 
succession of experiments, each of which had its lesson 
for all that were to come after. If we, in the nineteenth 
century, are to gain a better understanding of the divine 
conception than those who have gone before us have 
had, it must be by gathering the light of all these 
experiments into one bright focus, and studying the 
question in the full illumination thus produced. It is 
therefore directly relevant to the question before us to 
inquire what interpretations have been put upon the con- 
ception of Jesus in the past, — how it is understood in our 
own age, and what modes of organization have resulted 
from these interpretations. In view of these, the whole 
inquiry must be conducted. Three propositions have 
been tenaciously held, probably by a majority of those 
who, in different ages, have borne the Christian name, 
as undoubtedly sanctioned by the Founder of Chris- 
tianity. It is not at all necessary to inquire when or 
how that conception of the church, to which these three 
propositions are fundamental, originated. It is only 
necessary now to say, that it certainly originated in 
the early Christian ages, and has certainly exerted very 



14 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

great influence on the history of Christianity down to 
the present time. The three propositions referred to 
may be stated thus : — 

i. That Jesus himself constituted the twelve apos- 
tles and their successors in the apostolic office, a self- 
perpetuating corporation empowered to govern the 
church universal to the end of time. 

2. That baptism and the Lord's Supper are rites, 
the observance of which is of great importance to the 
spiritual welfare of all the faithful, and that these rites . 
are so intrusted to this same perpetual corporation, 
that in order that any believer may receive from the 
observance of them the benefits they are designed to 
confer, they must be exhibited by a ministry deriving 
its powers and functions from the appointment of this 
corporation. 

3. That the whole Christian church or kingdom of 
heaven, as Jesus conceived of it, was intended to 
present a visible organic unity under the government of 
this sacred apostolic corporation. 

Up to the time of the Lutheran Reformation, almost 
all Christendom had been for many centuries divided 
between the Latin and Greek churches, each realizing 
to the utmost of its power the system of which the 
three propositions stated above are the fundamental 
organic principles. Since the Reformation, church 
government has exhibited and does still exhibit very 
great variety and complication of forms ; but in them 
all, with perhaps very few exceptions, more or less 
traces of the influence of the three propositions above 
stated may be detected, though there are many organ- 
izations the adherents of which would earnestly reject 
them all, in the form in which they are stated above. 
Few if any of the Protestant denominations would 
accept either of them, yet perhaps it will be made to 



THE QUESTION STATED. 1 5 

appear, that comparatively few have entirely escaped 
from their influence. 

It is therefore exceedingly obvious what course our 
inquiries must necessarily pursue. If the three propo- 
sitions enunciated above do express the conception 
according to which Jesus founded that kingdom of 
heaven, of which the church in all Christian ages has 
claimed to be the living representative, then there is no 
room for further inquiry. Nothing in that case will 
remain, but that all Christian people should place them- 
selves under the authority of that sacred corporation 
which Jesus himself constituted, if indeed it can be 
ascertained which of several claimants is in the true 
apostolic succession, and endeavor by means of it to 
promote that reformation and salvation of a sinful world 
which Jesus promised to secure. One inquiry there- 
fore meets us in the very outset, and imperatively shuts 
off all other investigation till it is answered. Are the 
three propositions stated above a true expression 
of what Jesus meant by the kingdom of heaven? 
Do they rest on his authority? If they do, further 
discussion is useless and impertinent. If they do 
not, then they are of no force or validity, and the 
whole superstructure of church government built 
upon them, in whatever age or land, is without any 
solid foundation, and can lay no valid claim to the 
reverence or allegiance of any portion of the human 
race. Its pretended authority is a usurpation. No 
matter how early it originated ; no matter how long or 
how extensively it has prevailed ; it is of no force or 
validity, and is entitled to no place in our conception of 
the church which Jesus founded. Our first question 
then is, — Are these three propositions sustained by the 
authority of Jesus, the Christ of God ? 



1 6 THE KEYS OF SECT. 



CHAPTER II. 

THE PERPETUAL THEOCRACY. 

Considerations of great weight in determining the 
nature of the social state which Jesus founded seem to 
me to be suggested by the relations in which he stood 
to the prophets who had predicted his coming, and to 
that institution of religion, an account of which is given 
in the Old Testament. It is very generally assumed 
that the theocracy, which is the characteristic feature 
and the pervading idea of the Old Testament, originated 
with the Jewish state as instituted by Moses in the 
wilderness, and perished with it at the coming of the 
Messiah and the destruction of Jerusalem. This is, I 
think, far enough from being a true account of the 
matter. Moses did indeed, at the command of God, 
establish in the wilderness that civil polity and that 
ceremonial of religion, under which the theocracy was 
to be preserved and perpetuated through many ages, 
and to that polity Jehovah sustained very peculiar 
relations. But the theocracy existed before Moses. Its 
fundamental law was, that every human being owes 
primary allegiance to God, and that no human power 
or authority has any right to interfere with that alle- 
giance. In the Jewish state that law was applied 
alike to the priest and the people, to the ruler and the 
subject. It is manifest that the patriarchs, before the 
time of Moses, lived under such a government. If they 



THE PERPETUAL THEOCRACY. 1 7 

were devout men, it might most fitly be said of them, 
as of Enoch, that they "walked with God." Their 
individual lives were guided by such manifestations of 
God's will as might at any time be made to them, 
whether by natural or supernatural means. Over the 
nomadic tribes of the East, no human authority was 
exerted, except that of the patriarch over his own 
household. They were subject neither to kingly nor to 
priestly rule. They ascertained, as well as they were 
able by the lights which God afforded them, the way 
of righteousness, and walked in it. Theocracy, the 
government of God, was the only government they 
knew. 

The case of Abraham was peculiarly strong He 
was called of God to separate himself from his tribe 
and all his kindred, apparently for the very purpose 
of releasing him as much as possible from all the bonds 
of custom and prescription, that he might more surely 
obey the voice of God, train up a posterity in the way 
of righteousness, and become through all ages the 
father of the faithful. For three successive generations 
his descendants were trained under this directly theo- 
cratic government in the land of Canaan. To prepare 
them for the national destiny which awaited them, it 
seems to have been necessary, that for a season they 
should be apprenticed in Egypt, to learn the arts of 
civilized life from a people whose civilization was at 
that time probably superior to that of any other on 
earth. Here their history is for a considerable period 
lost, for the most part, from our view; but in every 
glimpse we get of it, the theocratic principle is strik- 
ingly manifested. Moses is called of God out of the 
land of Midian, to deliver the Hebrews from their 
bondage in Egypt. He has nothing on which to rely 
for success in that great undertaking but the promise 



15 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

of God. He has no means of persuading Pharoah to 
let the people go but the command of God. But he 
fearlessly assumes, that mighty kings as well as every 
individual subject owe primary allegiance to the God 
of heaven ; and he urges the uncompromising demand 
of Jehovah, till that haughty monarch yields, and he 
and all his people " send them out in haste." 

The Israelites themselves had no reason to confide 
in Moses, except the evidence he gave them that God 
had sent him. The whole transaction was purely theo- 
cratic. Moses sustained no official relation to the peo- 
ple, but commanded and guided them only by the 
authority of God. Yet, though he led them into the 
great and terrible wilderness, and not directly into 
the land of Canaan as they probably expected, they 
followed wherever he led them. Sometimes they were 
weary of the tedious way, and were in imminent peril of 
perishing in the wilderness, and though they sometimes 
murmured and demanded to be conducted back into 
Egypt, yet the convincing proof that God was in very 
deed with Moses still prevailed, and they abode under 
his command in that wilderness, till their civil polity 
and their religious ceremonial were fully established. 
Then another leader whom God had raised up led 
them into the land of Canaan. 

If now we examine this whole Mosaic institution, 
whether of religious ceremonial or civil polity, we shall 
find that, instead of setting aside that direct theocratic 
government which had previously existed, it confirmed 
and perpetuated it. I cannot, without too great a 
digression from the purpose I have in view, enter into 
a thorough investigation of the priesthood instituted 
by Moses. But I run no risk in making the assertion, 
that it differs so widely and fundamentally from any 
other priesthood that ever existed, as to create a strong 



THE PERPETUAL THEOCRACY. 19 

presumption that it originated in divine appointment. 
The only peculiarity however with which I am now 
concerned is, that it in no degree made the priest the 
lord of conscience. The allegiance of the individual 
was due directly to God, with no intervention of priestly 
authority. There was a prescribed ceremonial, which 
the priest only could perform. But the law, which pre- 
scribed that ceremonial in its minutest details, did not 
emanate from the priesthood, and could in no respect 
be changed by priestly authority. It bound the priest 
equally with the people. The priest had no right to 
affix any penalty for the violation of the law on the 
part of the people. Both in respect to the priest and 
the people, the penalty was with God alone. If there 
was corruption in the priestly office, God would punish 
it ; and sometimes did punish it in an awful manner, as 
in the case of the corrupt sons of Eli. If the people 
neglected or profaned the offerings of God, or forsook 
the way of righteousness, God visited their iniquities 
upon them and their children. But the priest could 
neither make the law, nor inflict a penalty on those who 
violated it. Thus both in the legislative and execu- 
tive function, the theocratic principle remained unim- 
paired. v 

The priesthood could exercise no control over the 
administration of the government in any department. 
We are told, that on the eve of the battle of Platea, the l 
Lacedemonian army was attacked by the Persians in 
overwhelming numbers. The attack was a surprise. 
The Athenian allies were separated from the Lace- 
demonians, and in marching to their assistance were 
met by a detachment of the enemy, and unable to join 
their forces, or render needed aid. In these alarming 
circumstances, Pausanias the Spartan general, instead 
of repelling the attack at once with the best means at 



20 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

his command, ordered a solemn sacrifice, that the will 
of the gods might be first ascertained by priestly in- 
spection of the entrails of the slaughtered victims. 
The officiating priests pronounced the, omens thus pre- 
sented unpropitious. The priests were ordered to 
repeat the sacrifice. Meanwhile the Spartans were 
standing in solid phalanx without discharging an arrow, 
protecting themselves as best they could from the 
arrows of the enemy with their broad shields. While 
they were waiting in this manner, and many had already 
been wounded, and some had fallen, the omens were 
again and again declared by the priests to be unpropi- 
tious, and the eager soldiers were not permitted to 
engage in the battle, till the priests gave out that the 
omens promised victory. 1 

As I read this narrative, the question presented to my 
mind is, not whether I can admire the religious rever- 
ence of the Greeks, which it strikingly exhibits, but 
what estimate I am to form of such a priestly power as 
this, capable of being used, as it surely was, to render 
useless the military skill of the general, however great, 
and the bravery of his army, however trustworthy. No 
people can live under such a priesthood, and be sub- 
jected to it for successive generations, without being 
morally degraded, and politically imperilled by it. The 
true question in such a crisis is, not what indications 
priests profess to see in the entrails of beasts slain in 
sacrifice, but what is the best instant use which a gen- 
eral can make of the resources at his command, to 
repel the attack and save his army and his country 
from destruction. We hear much in these times in cer- 
tain quarters, of Jewish superstition. The Jewish priest- 



1 Wilson's Outlines of History, p. 693, quoted from Bulwer 

Athens. 



THE PERPETUAL THEOCRACY. 21 

hood gave no opportunity for the manifestation of any- 
such superstition as this. This is Spartan, not Jewish 
superstition I think these assertions may be made in 
reference to the whole system of Jewish sacrifices with 
perfect safety. 

It must be admitted however, that one function of 
the high-priest seems to be an exception to the princi- 
ple which pervades all other parts of this ceremonial. 
The ruler, as well as the private citizen, owed direct 
allegiance to God, and the universal authority of the 
theocracy over him was recognized in the institution of 
Urim and Thummim. Great obscurity hangs about this 
institution, and probably the manner of its use cannot 
be satisfactorily ascertained from any description of it 
now extant. It is plain however, that it was a pre- 
scribed method by which a ruler or public personage 
might inquire after the will of God in relation to mat- 
ters of dractical importance, through the high-priest 
ministering in the tabernacle in full priestly dress. It 
does not appear to have sustained any relation to the 
ordinary functions of the priesthood, nor does the high- 
priest himself appear to have had the power of return- 
ing such an answer as might be dictated by his own 
caprice, or subservient to his private ends. The answer 
seems to have been given in such a manner, as to 
be equally manifest to him who was inquiring of God, 
as to the high-priest through whom the inquiry was 
made. 

I am greatly confirmed in this view of the case, by 
the intimate and exceedingly important relation of the 
prophetic function, to the whole Jewish state. This 
function was by no means confined to the predicting of 
future events, but was concerned with the manifesting 
of the will of God in reference to all that affected the 
duty or the well-being of the people, whether present 



22 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

or future. The prophet was pre-eminently an instruc- 
tor of the people in practical duty, and his authority 
was paramount to every other. The prophet must 
indeed furnish proof that his message was really the 
word of the Lord. Of that evidence, the people must 
judge on their own responsibility. If they followed 
false' prophets, they would suffer the consequences. 
If they rejected the message of a true prophet, they 
would equally be held responsible. In this respect, 
they were exactly like the religious teachers of the 
present time. All is now, as in the times of the old 
prophets, subject to private judgment. It is true, we 
have ecclesiastical systems which deny the right of 
private judgment to the people altogether. But after 
all, in free countries, it rests with the people themselves 
whether to adhere to those systems or not, and there- 
fore the ultimate appeal is to private judgment. So 
was it in respect to the prophets of Israel. Those 
prophets were numerous, and there were prophets of 
Baal as well as prophets of God. If at any time the 
people became corrupt, and disposed to forsake the 
way of righteousness, false prophets would become more 
numerous and more arrogant in their pretensions ; and 
he who would obey the voice of the Lord must distin- 
guish the true from the false, the precious from the 
vile. This is religious liberty, and the people of Israel 
pre-eminently enjoyed it. 

The authority of the true prophet of God was above 
that of the kings. David, in the height of his power, 
listened with the reverence of a child to the word of the 
Lord at the mouth of Nathan the prophet, and at his 
severe and withering rebuke humbled himself, and said, 
"I have sinned against the Lord." Jeremiah could not 
be silenced from proclaiming the word of the Lord in 
the very court of King Zedekiah, and the solemn denun- 



THE PERPETUAL THEOCRACY. 23 

ciations of Elijah were a terror to the house of Ahab, 
and to all Israel, though apostate from GocL In our 
ignorance of the method of inquiring of God by Urim 
and Thummim, it would not be fair or philosophical to 
conclude, that it was in utter violation of the right of 
private judgment which certainly pervaded all the rest 
of the system. It is certain that the priests were not 
ex-qfficio prophets. The prophets of God were just as 
likely to be raised up from any other as from a priestly 
tribe, and had just as much authority over the priests 
as over any other portion of the people. 

The relation of the prophets to the kings is very 
strikingly illustrated by the narrative of the alliance 
between Jehoshaphat king of Judah, and Ahab king of 
Israel, to go to . Ramoth-Gilead to fight the Syrians. 
Jehoshaphat wished to inquire of the Lord concerning 
the undertaking. Ahab had four hundred prophets of 
Baal at hand, ready for the emergency, and they with one 
consent assured the confederate kings of the divine 
favor on the enterprise, and of certain victory. Jehosh- 
aphat however, not satisfied with the prophets of Baal, 
asked if there was not a prophet of the Lord of whom 
they might inquire. Ahab said there was one, but, said 
he, " I hate him, because he does not prophesy good 
but evil concerning me." Jehoshaphat insisted, and 
the prophet of the Lord was sent for. As Ahab had 
apprehended, he prophesied with great boldness in 
presence of both these kings and of the mocking proph- 
ets of Baal, the utter defeat of the armies of Israel, and 
that Ahab would be slain in battle. Ahab, in great 
rage, ordered him to be put in prison, and fed with 
bread and water till he should return in peace. Micaiah, 
the Lord's prophet, answered, "If thou at all return in 
peace, the Lord hath not spoken by me." The confed- 
erate kings went to battle, following the advice of the 



24 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

prophets of Baal, and Ahab was slain according to the 
word of the Lord. 1 

The Messiah was foretold as a prophet of the Lord. 
Moses said, " The Lord thy God will raise up unto thee 
a prophet in the midst of thee, of thy brethren, like unto 
me. Unto him shall ye hearken." 2 I am quite ready 
to admit that these words are general, that they point 
to the prophetic function in long succession. But they 
also point pre-eminently to the Messiah, as the com- 
plete development and impersonation of ihat function. 
Accordingly he appeared just as all the prophets of the 
Lord before him had appeared, bearing his own creden- 
tials. John the Baptist did indeed bear witness of him. 
But John also appeared only as the prophet of the 
Lord, claiming audience and obedience only on the 
credential-s which he bore with him. Neither the one 
nor the other waited for any official recognition. The 
Jewish system knew nothing of any official authority by 
which a prophet was to be recognized and accredited to 
the people. The people must judge for themselves who 
were the Lord's prophets. Thus Jesus warned the 
people with great emphasis against false prophets in 
his own time. " Beware of false prophets, which come 
to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are raven- 
ing wolves. Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do 
men gather grapes of thorns or figs of thistles ? " 3 When 
his enemies asked him by what authority he did these 
things, he retorted by asking them, what they thought 
of John the Baptist. This reply put them to confusion, 
because great multitudes of them had followed John, 
though John furnished no other credentials, than the 
evidence that he was the prophet of the Lord. Jesus 
himself was constantly producing the same. 

1 i Kings xxii : 1-37. 2 Deuteronomy xviii : 15. 

8 Matt, vii : 15, 16. 



THE PERPETUAL THEOCRACY. 25 

In his whole career we are constantly confronted 
with this theocratic authority. He always spoke and 
acted " as one having authority and not as the scribes." 
It was with the authority of a prophet of the Lord that 
he preached repentance, delivered the Sermon on the 
Mount and all his teachings, and stood with sublime 
majesty before the high-priest and the Roman governor. 
In all this, in everything, he was the perfect develop- 
ment and completion of the prophetic function, as it 
had existed in all the ages of the theocracy. To no 
authority vested in human hands was he responsible, 
and he demanded the reverent reception of all his 
teachings from the great and the lowly alike in the 
name of the Lord. No grander exercise of the right 
of private judgment was ever performed than that of 
the twelve apostles in obeying his command, " Follow 
me," or of Paul in rendering implicit obedience " to 
the heavenly vision." In his own career, it is most 
characteristically true, that in respect to this funda- 
mental principle of the theocracy he did not come to 
destroy the law and the prophets but to fulfil them. 
It never did stand forth so sublimely before all men as 
in the whole earthly life of Jesus, the Christ of God. 
It is as certain as his words and deeds could make it, 
that instead of coming to abolish that theocratic prin- 
ciple, he came to enthrone it, and make it everlasting, 
to constitute it the dominant element in the civilization 
of all Christian ages and lands. If we know anything 
of his plan, we know this. 

So the apostles understood this matter after his 
resurrection and ascension. They stood before the 
multitude on the day of Pentecost, seeking and exer- 
cising no other authority than that of prophets of the 
Lord. When, a few days after, Peter and John were 
brought before the Jewish council and threatened, and 



26 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

" commanded not to speak at all nor teach in the name 
of Jesus," their answer is one of the sublimest declara- 
tions of the principle, which can be found in the whole 
long history of the struggle for religious liberty. 
" Whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken 
unto you more than unto God, judge ye. For we 
cannot but speak the things which we have seen and 
heard." * The same principle is reasserted in every 
effort of the apostles and their fellow-laborers to propa- 
gate the gospel and found the church of Christ in all 
the world. 

We may therefore be absolutely certain, that instead 
of so constituting his kingdom as to annul or in any 
way weaken this principle, he will preserve and per- 
petuate it, and enthrone it wherever the glad tidings 
of the kingdom are received. Is it then credible that 
he constituted the twelve apostles and their successors 
in the apostolic office a self-perpetuating corporation, 
intrusted with the government of his kingdom, even in 
all its minutest details, in all coming ages ? The Jewish 
priestly function was hereditary ih the male line. Let 
us suppose, for the better understanding of this matter, 
that the sons of Levi, and especially the descendants 
in the male line of the family of Aaron, had not only 
been secure by hereditary right of all the functions of 
the priesthood which were conferred on them by the 
law of Moses, but that they had also been invested 
with unlimited powers of legislation over the people, 
in all things pertaining to the worship of God and pri- 
vate morality, and with judicial and executive powers 
to punish all violations of the laws which they enacted, 
by depriving the disobedient of their religious rights 
and privileges. The theocracy would have been at an 

1 Acts iv : 19, 20. 



THE PERPETUAL THEOCRACY. 27 

end, and under such a system the primary allegiance 
of the people would have been to God only through 
the priesthood. Such legislation would have invested 
that priesthood with a spiritual despotism as absolute 
and crushing as ever existed on earth. 

This is just such a government as Jesus would have 
constituted over his kingdom in all the ages, if he had 
committed the government of it to such a corporation. 
It would be unspeakably absurd to pretend that Jesus 
enacted any constitution according to which his king- 
dom was to be governed in any such manner. He is the 
moral legislator of the ages, but he has left no traces 
of any constitutional or political laws for the govern- 
ment of his kingdom. If it was to be governed by 
such a corporation, the powers of that corporation are 
limited by no constitution. Yet it needs no argument 
to show, that in order to govern such a world-wide 
perpetual society forever, it would be an imperative 
necessity, that that corporation should enact a system 
of political laws according to which their government 
should be administered. 

Let us examine this point. The apostles were to 
appoint their own successors, according to the claim 
we are examining, and induct them into office. In 
what manner was this power of appointment and 
investment to be exercised ? By the whole corporation 
acting as the great council of the whole church ? Or 
may each individual apostle at his own discretion 
ordain to the apostolic office ? This question must be 
settled, and could only be determined by the apostolic 
corporation acting as a legislative body. The very 
first thing to be done, in discharging the trust com- 
mitted to them, must have been an act of political 
legislation. The exercise of this appointing power 
could not long have been left to the discretion of 



28 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

individual members of the body corporate. Such an 
exercise of it would have soon brought the apostolic 
office to the level of the whole Christian brotherhood, 
and the apostolic corporation to an end. Many of us 
remember how rapidly, in the great war of the Rebellion, 
officers of the rank of brigadier-general were multiplied. 
On the supposition that each brigadier-general, on re- 
ceiving his commission, had been invested with the 
power of creating as many more officers of the same 
rank as he pleased, how long would it have been before 
our whole army would have been composed of brigadier- 
generals, with no privates to be commanded ? A simi- 
lar result would have followed, if each member of the 
apostolic corporation had been invested with unlimited 
power of ordaining to the apostolic office whomsoever 
he would. For the corporation to have left matters to 
be conducted thus would have been to commit suicide. 
There must therefore of necessity have been from 
the very beginning a system of organic law, enacted by 
the corporation itself, and authoritative over all Chris- 
tian people, prescribing the rules by which the succes- 
sion to the apostolic office was to be regulated, denning 
the sphere within which each member of the corpora- 
tion should exercise his functions, and the extent of 
those functions, and determining to which successor 
of the apostles each follower of Jesus was subjected in 
the Lord. As the kingdom was to cover the whole 
world, this system of organic law must be coextensive 
with the prevalence of Christianity, and constantly 
widen its area with each new conquest of the kingdom 
of God. It must be a system of political legislation 
as wide as the moral and spiritual reign of the Messiah 
on earth. As new exigencies should arise, there would 
be a felt necessity or propriety of carrying this legisla- 
tion more and more into the details of forms and modes 



THE PERPETUAL THEOCRACY. 29 

of worship and the moralities of private life, and pla- 
cing in the hands of those officials, by whom the gov- 
ernment was administered under the authority of the 
corporation, more ample means of procuring the obedi- 
ence of all the faithful. 

It would also be found to be a necessity, that this 
world-wide government should have a political head, 
from which all the radii of administration should 
diverge, and reach the remotest portions of the uni- 
versal kingdom. That head might be a great council, 
representing and acting in the name of the universal 
apostolic corporation. Or it might be an individual man, 
invested with* the powers of the whole corporation, and 
acting in its name and by its authority, and a succes- 
sion to that more than monarchial or imperial throne 
might be regulated by a law enacted by the sacred 
corporation. Either of these modes of government 
would be possible, but considering the tendencies of 
human nature in the past ages of the world, the 
monarchial constitution of such a vast religious empire 
would have been much more likely to be adopted, and 
in all probability much better, or at least much less 
open to objection than the aristocratic. 

I affirm then, that if Jesus did by his authority as 
the Christ of God constitute the twelve apostles a per- 
petual close corporation, intrusted with the govern- 
ment of his church forever, he must have intended to 
establish substantially such a hierarchy as the Roman 
Catholic Church, not only such as it is in fact, but 
such as it is in theory, such as it would be if the schisms 
that separated from it the Greek, the Armenian, the 
Nestorian, the Coptic and the Abyssinian churches were 
all healed, and all these bodies brought back into its 
bosom, and the great insurrection of Protestantism 
were effectually quelled, and the authority of the pope 



$Q THE KEYS OF SECT. 

submissively recognized wherever the Christian name 
is found. I do not mean to say, that if the founder of 
Christianity established such an apostolic corporation, 
the Roman Catholic Church must necessarily be ac- 
cepted as its authorized succession and embodiment ; 
but that substantially such a hierarchy in its funda- 
mental organic principles is its only logical develop- 
ment. Such a corporation must logically develop itself 
not merely into a hierarchy such as Rome has actually 
established, but such as Hildebrand aspired to in the 
loftiest vaultings of his ambition, and such as Cardinal 
Manning conceives of, when he speaks of the church as 
a sovereignty wholly independent of the state, and 
entitled itself to judge in all questions of jurisdiction 
which may arise between it and the state, because it 
alone is invested with the attribute of infallibility. 

How then does the fundamental principle of the 
theocracy fare under such a system as this? It is 
annihilated. The prophetic voice is silent. The priest 
both makes all ecclesiastical law, and administers and 
enforces it. He is the sole guardian and dispenser of 
all religious rights and privileges. There can be no 
choice here between the true and the false prophet. 
There is nothing for the people under such a system 
but implicit, uncomplaining and unthinking submission 
to priestly authority. When such a system is firmly 
established, what can a prophet of the Lord do, unless 
he speaks the words of the priestly power that governs 
everything ? There can be no prophet of the Lord but 
the regularly constituted priest, and no word of the 
Lord but the priest's behest. In every part and period 
of the history of Christendom, just in proportion as the 
theory of the apostolic corporation for the government 
of the church has been adopted and practically applied, 
the right of private judgment has been denied and 



THE PERPETUAL THEOCRACY. 3 1 

trampled out. This is a logical necessity verified by 
the experience of twelve hundred years. Those pas- 
sionate struggles of the weak old man who lately ruled 
the universal Roman Catholic world, under the pre- 
tence of being the successor of Peter, the primate of 
the apostles, to extinguish the right of private judgment 
as one of the damnable heresies of the nineteenth cen- 
tury, were but logical developments of the assumption, 
that the apostles were erected into a perpetual close 
corporation, with power to govern the church in all 
ages. 

We may be assured, that if the Messiah himself were 
to come again to such a people in a simple prophetic 
character, no matter what his credentials might be, he 
would be silenced by the voice of an authority which 
would not tolerate him for a moment. Jesus himself 
got a hearing in the world, only because Judaism 
knew no such authority over conscience and private 
judgment. The leaders of the people at Jerusalem 
tried to silence both him and the apostles by authority. 
But it was a usurped authority unknown to the Jewish 
system, and the people paid little regard to it. Jesus 
gained a hearing in the city where he was brought up 
from childhood, to announce himself as the Messiah 
in the Jewish synagogue, where doubtless he and his 
parents habitually resorted on the Sabbath to worship 
God. 1 It was his custom from Sabbath to Sabbath to 
preach to the people in the synagogues of Galilee. 
The ideas that had come down to them from their 
ancestors led them to expect religious instruction, not 
from the priesthood alone, but from any one whom the 
Lord might qualify to speak for the edification of the 
people. It is often assumed, that the long discipline 

1 Luke iv : 15-30. 



32 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

of the Jewish people under patriarchs and prophets 
had utterly failed of any beneficent result in the forma- 
tion of the national character. No assumption could 
be further from the truth. Not only had a people 
been prepared by this process for the reception of the 
Messiah, but by the same process the highway of the 
Lord had been prepared over most of the then known 
world. The Jews were even then a very widely dis- 
persed people, and wherever they dwelt in any consid- 
erable numbers, they carried their religion with them,, 
and the synagogue was found. In these synagogues, 
the missionaries of the risen Christ found their first 
audiences and preached their first sermons, in nearly 
every city which they visited. Barnabas and Saul of 
Tarsus were the first missionaries that carried the 
gospel to Antioch in Pisidia. Doubtless according to 
their usual custom, immediately after their arrival they 
went into the synagogue on the Sabbath and sat down. 
After the law and the prophets had been read, the 
rulers of the synagogue sent to the strange brethren 
present, saying, " Men and brethren, if ye have any 
word of exhortation unto the people, say on." l Paul 
arose and preached unto them Jesus the crucified 
Christ, whom God raised from the dead. Many of the 
Jews and proselytes believed, and the Gentiles who 
were present besought that these words might be 
spoken unto them the next Sabbath. On that day, 
almost the whole city came together to hear the word 
of God. 2 This enlarged liberty of utterance had come 
down to them from their ancestors, and their training 
under the theocracy. Congregations of men thus 
trained to religious liberty were found in every city of 
the empire, and were the connecting link along which 

1 Acts xiii : 15. 2 Acts xiii : 14-4S. 



THE PERPETUAL THEOCRACY. 33 

Christian truth found its way to the Gentile world. 
Verily, there is a God in history. 

The question we have here to decide is, whether it 
can be easily believed that in constituting his universal 
kingdom, Jesus crushed out this individual religious 
freedom, which had been cherished under the theocracy 
from the days of Moses and even of Abraham, and 
established in its stead such a hierarchy as must, we 
have seen, have inevitably resulted from the govern- 
ment of such a perpetual corporation as we are con- 
sidering. If one will candidly weigh the matters 
presented in this chapter, he will, I think, admit that, 
whatever Jesus might be disposed to abolish or modify 
in the Mosaic system, this theocratic element would 
be retained and rendered universal and perpetual. He 
will acknowledge that nothing else is so antecedently 
improbable, as his establishing or favoring such a hie- 
rarchy as, it has been shown, must have resulted from 
a perpetual corporation empowered to govern the 
whole church of God. 

The obvious truth of the case is, that in no respect 
are the writings of the Old and the New Testaments 
more gloriously in harmony, and more characteristically 
distinguished from all the other literatures of the world, 
than in this one principle of the primary allegiance of 
every human soul to God. That principle absolutely 
pervades all these books, though separated from each 
other in the times at which they were written by a 
period of not less than two thousand years. Wherever 
in the world Christianity has had free course, it has 
always carried this principle with it, and made it a 
dominant force in society. It is in virtue of this prin- 
ciple, that Christianity has become the recognized relig- 
ion of freedom in all history; and wherever its influ- 
ence has been modified and weakened by substituting 
3 



34 THE KEYS' OF SECT. 

hierarchy for theocracy, there it has become the relig- 
ion of absolute despotism and not of freedom. I must 
therefore believe, that Jesus intended to give universal 
prevalence and power to that theocracy by which the 
Jewish people and the world were trained for his recep- 
tion, and by which, in the fulness of time, he was ushered 
in ; and for the same reason, I must reject the doctrine 
of a perpetual apostolic corporation as utterly subver- 
sive of that theocracy. 



THE PERPETUAL PASSOVER. 35 



CHAPTER III. 

THE PERPETUAL PASSOVER. 

That conception o' the kingdom of heaven which, 
as has been admitted, has received the sanction of a 
large majority of all those who in different ages have 
borne the Christian name, not only accepts the doctrine 
of the perpetual apostolic corporation, but assumes that 
the rites of baptism and the Lord's Supper are in such 
a sense intrusted to the keeping of that same corpora- 
tion, that no believer can receive from the observance 
of them the benefits they are designed to confer, unless 
they are exhibited by a ministry deriving its powers and 
functions from the appointment of that same corpora- 
tion. For these reasons, these two rites have come to 
occupy a very conspicuous place in the government of 
the church in all the past ages of its history. In prose- 
cuting the work I have undertaken, it will therefore be 
necessary to inquire in what relations to this kingdom 
Jesus really placed these rites. It is my design in this 
chapter to prosecute this inquiry in respect to the Lord's 
Supper. It seems to me that the relation in which 
Jesus stood to the theocracy sheds much light on this 
question, as well as on the question discussed in the 
previous chapter. 

It is by no means intended to imply in the heading 
of this chapter, that there is an absolute identity in all 
respects of the Lord's Supper as instituted by Jesus, 



36 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

and the Passover as instituted by Moses. I do not 
know that our Lord himself ever called the rite which 
he instituted the Passover. But there are points of inti- 
mate relationship and close resemblance between the 
two which are certainly very striking, and, it seems to 
me, very instructive. 

1. The occasion on which the new Christian rite 
was instituted is very remarkable. Probably it was our 
Lord's custom from childhood annually to observe the 
Passover in its appointed season ; but we have no 
account of his observing it on any other occasion than 
this, or of his observing it at any other time with his 
disciples as constituting a family. But the crucifixion 
was just at hand, and he sent two of his disciples to 
procure a room and make preparation for his eating the 
Passover with his disciples before he should suffer. 
On the appointed evening, they all sat down together at 
the feast of the Passover. In the midst of that feast, 
he made use of the unleavened bread which was on 
the table, and the wine which had been prepared for 
the evening entertainment, to institute a new rite, 
which was to be observed wherever the gospel of the 
kingdom should be preached. The appearance cer- 
tainly is that he intended that this new rite should take 
the place of the old, and sustain the same relation to 
the Messianic kingdom, which the Passover had sus- 
tained to the institution of religion established by 
Moses. In this observance of the Passover in the 
upper chamber at Jerusalem, the ancient rite was not 
abolished, but divested of its national character, and 
made universal and perpetual. The feast began with 
the Passover and ended with the Lord's Supper. 

2. The design of the two observances was strikingly 
similar. The Jewish Passover was intended as a per- 
petual monument of the great event in the history of the 



THE PERPETUAL PASSOVER. 37 

founding of that nation and that peculiar institution of 
religion which, as was shown in a previous chapter, 
preserved and perpetuated the theocratic principle 
through many dark and stormy ages, much as the tables 
of the law were preserved in the sacred ark of the cove- 
nant from being lost or corrupted in times of ignorance 
and barbarism. Just as the whole use of the ark con- 
sisted in preserving and transmitting the tables of the 
law, the whole value of the Mosaic institution of relig- 
ion lay in transmitting the theocratic principle down to 
the time when the Messiah should appear, and training 
under its influence a people to receive the Messiah and 
communicate his better revelation of God to the rest of 
the world. In all subsequent ages of Jewish history, 
by this annual commemoration, the Jew was reminded 
of that great deliverance from which his nation dated 
its origin, and his faith in the God of Israel was revived 
and strengthened. It was a monument of the event it 
commemorated more enduring than bronze, and power- 
fully tended to keep alive the worship of Israel's God. 
If religion declined at any time, and the worship of God 
was neglected, this observance fell into disuse. In times 
of repentance and national reformation of worship and 
morals, the Passover was revived and celebrated with 
great solemnity and enthusiasm. 1 Thus fidelity in this 
observance was both a means of preserving their faith 
and worship in purity, and the consequence and fit 
expression of national repentance, after seasons of 
religious declension and apostasy. 

The design of the Lord's Supper had an exactly simi- 
lar relation to the great event in the founding of Chris- 
tianity, — the crucifixion of its Founder. In the act of 
instituting the Supper Jesus said, "This do in remem- 

* 

1 2 Kings xxiii: 21-23. 2 Chron. xxx: 15. Ezra vi : 20. 



38 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

brance of me." As the Passover was a perpetual monu- 
ment of the deliverance of Israel from the plague that 
destroyed in one night all the first-born of the Egyp- 
tians, and from grievous bondage in Egypt, so the 
Supper was intended as a perpetual monument of the 
deliverance of all believers in the crucified Christ, from 
the more fearful destruction and the more galling bond- 
age of sin. As in all Christian ages and lands, that 
rite should be observed, faith would be strengthened 
and devotion intensified. If at any time there should 
be apostasy from the Christian faith, this observance 
would either be corrupted and obscured by superstition, 
or would fall into neglect and disuse. In times of refor- 
mation, it would be revived in the purity and simplicity 
of the primitive institution, and be celebrated with new 
fervor of devotion. This account of the design of the 
Passover and the Lord's Supper agrees both with the 
original declaration of their founders, and with their 
history in all subsequent ages. 

3. Commemoration certainly was the leading design 
of the Passover, but not its only design. Another end 
to be answered by it is thus stated by its Founder, 
"That ye may know how that the Lord hath put a dif- 
ference between the Eyptians and Israel." 1 It was 
intended that the people of Israel should be the guar- 
dians of a peculiar and sacred principle of religion, which 
the nations of the world were by no means prepared at 
that time to receive, and that they should be trained by 
it for a great service which they were in their subse- 
quent history to render to all nations. For this purpose 
it was necessary that they should be separated from all 
other nations as a peculiar people. The observance of 
the Passover was intended to be a badge, by which they 

a 

1 Exodus xi : 7. 



THE PERPETUAL PASSOVER. 39 

would be thus distinguished as the worshippers of Jeho- 
vah, and as peculiarly enjoying his favor. It was a dis- 
tinguishing mark set on that people who, because they 
obeyed Jehovah's voice, were protected from all harm 
in that terrible night in which all the first-born of Egypt 
perished. Every observance of it implied a promise, 
that, on condition of their fidelity to God, he would in 
like manner put a difference between them and the 
nations around them that did not worship God, by the 
blessings he would confer on them and the calamities 
from which he would deliver them. 

In like manner the disciples of the crucified Christ 
were to be the perpetual representatives of that kingdom 
of righteousness which he founded by his mediatorial 
mission, and especially by his crucifixion and resurrec- 
tion. They were to be distinguished by the exalted and 
worthy ideas which they entertained of God, by the 
freedom of their worship from superstition, by the purity 
of their morals, by their universal philanthropy, and by 
the blessings temporal and spiritual which they would 
enjoy in consequence of their adhesion to Jesus the 
crucified Christ. The observance of the Lord's Supper 
was to be a perpetual badge of distinction by which this 
peculiar people might be everywhere distinguished from 
the rest of mankind, and which all might wear who 
wished openly to avow their faith in him, of whatever 
nation, language, or kindred among men. 

It is wonderful to how great an extent this observance 
has been in fact a distinguishing badge of the follow- 
ers of the crucified Messiah. Those who reject him in 
his high mediatorial office have little regard for the 
Lord's Supper, though they may assume the Christian 
name. With them the observance either passes into 
disuse or neglect, or is retained with little faith and 
fervor. On the other hand, the millions who have 



4-0 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

buried Christianity under a mass of superstition and 
fable have never failed to corrupt this rite with a ritual, 
in which scarce a trace of the original institution can be 
discerned. Thus the celebration of it with earnestness 
and fervor in its original simplicity is and ever has 
been very accurately distinctive of the followers of Jesus 
the crucified Christ. The badge is so constructed that 
they who are the spiritual disciples of the Master are 
eager to assume it, while those who are not are either 
indisposed to wear it, or are disgusted with its simplicity, 
and mar it with their own inventions. The badge re- 
tains its distinctive character by a self-regulating power. 
This is certainly very remarkable. 

4. Another striking peculiarity must not be omitted, 
though I do not remember to have seen it insisted on. 
The Lord's Supper has a very remarkable peculiarity 
among commemorative observances, in the fact that it 
was instituted in anticipation of an event which had not 
yet occurred. The same is true of the Passover. When 
the families of Israel, throughout all the land of Egypt, 
assembled on that night in their dwellings, each having 
prepared the lamb from which for the first time the 
Passover was to be eaten, the destruction of the first- 
born of Egypt was yet future, and had been made 
known to the people who were to celebrate it only by 
the prophet of the Lord. The same was true of their 
own deliverance from bondage. They prepared and 
ate the feast in faith of what was to be. It was a pro- 
phetic, not a commemorative observance ; but it was 
never again to be prophetic. That very night the 
destroying angel would visit every dwelling of the 
Egyptians, but the blood of the lamb on the door-post 
and lintel of each dwelling of the Israelites was to be 
the pledge that he would "pass over" them, and that 
no harm should befall them. The next day, while all 



THE PERPETUAL PASSOVER. 41 

Egypt was in mourning, from the palace of proud Pha- 
raoh to the humblest hovel of all his subjects, the Israel- 
ites should escape forever from the cruel bondage under 
which they were groaning, and every subsequent observ- 
ance of the rite should be commemorative of the mighty 
deliverance. Thus we have the remarkable coincidence, 
that both the rite which commemorated the founding of 
the Mosaic institution of religion, and that which in like 
manner was to commemorate the founding of the Mes- 
sianic kingdom, were instituted and once observed pro- 
phetically, and became ever afterwards memorials of a 
mighty deliverance actually achieved. Moses in insti- 
tuting the Passover, and Jesus in instituting the Supper, 
acted each purely in his prophetic character, and exclu- 
sively by theocratic authority. To Moses stood opposed, 
in fearful array, all the pride and pomp and military 
prowess of the monarch of Egypt, and he had nothing 
wherewith to withstand him but the word of the Lord. 
Against Jesus was arrayed all the malignity of the lead- 
ers of the corrupted Jewish state, in league for the 
moment with the resistless power of Rome, and he had 
nothing to rely on but the authority of the unrecognized 
Messiah, and of that King who on the morrow was to 
win his crown on the cross. Each believed in God 
and was clearly conscious of his great mission, and 
instituted a rite which was to commemorate through 
unnumbered ages an event which had not yet occurred, 
but would occur on the morrow. This is a remark- 
able resemblance indeed. Let all the annals of history 
be searched for a parallel. Yet neither in the institu- 
tion of the Sapper, nor in anything that Jesus said of 
it, is there any hint that this coincidence was designed 
or even thought of. That is left to the insight of the 
reader. 

5. Another resemblance must not be omitted. Any 



42 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

intervention of the priestly function was unnecessary to 
the observance of the Passover. Its first observance 
antedated the priesthood, and the whole Mosaic ritual ; 
and even after the institution of the priesthood, it was 
not placed in any necessary relation to the Passover. 
That feast was interwoven with other parts of the 
Jewish ritual by the subsequent legislation of Moses. 
It was followed by the seven days' feast of unleavened 
bread, in which were solemn convocations unto the 
Lord, and the priests killed the customary burnt offer- 
ings. The people were commanded no longer to ob- 
serve the Passover at their own homes, but to con- 
gregate for the purpose at the place chosen out of all 
their tribes, where the Lord recorded his name. But it 
still did not lose its domestic character. The father, 
priest of his own house, was still competent to kill the 
lamb, " the sacrifice of the Passover." In some instances, 
as in Hezekiah's Passover, 1 that service was performed 
by the priests, but a special reason was assigned for 
their doing it in this case. "For there were many in 
the congregation that were not sanctified ; therefore, the 
Levites had the charge of the killing of the passover 
for every one that was not clean, to sanctify them unto 
the Lord." So far then was it from being true that the 
killing of the passover was a priestly function, that it 
was deemed necessary to assign the reason why, in this 
case, they observed it "otherwise than it is written." 
Though the people assembled at Jerusalem for the 
observance of the feast, they still observed it by fam- 
ilies. It is not to be supposed that the two disciples 
whom Jesus sent to find a " guest-chamber where he 
might observe the Passover with his disciples," 2 were the 
only persons who were on that day walking the streets 

1 2 Chron. xxx : Z.-18. 2 Luke xxii : ir. 



THE PERPETUAL PASSOVER. 43 

of Jerusalem on a similar errand. The city must have 
abounded in arrangements for furnishing such accom- 
modations. 

In the institution of the Supper, there is also the 
absence of any recognition of a priestly function to be 
exercised in its observance. It even loses its sacrificial 
character. The old Passover pointed, like the needle 
to the pole, to the one great sacrifice that was to be 
offered. With the same index finger, the new Passover 
pointed backward to the same sacrifice, which had been 
offered by the crucified Christ of God. It was simply 
a feast, to be observed by the followers of Jesus in all 
succeeding times, in commemoration of the founding of 
the Messianic kingdom. It is very noticeable that, in 
his last observance of the Passover, Jesus departed from 
the domestic character of the institution. The persons 
who united in the observance did not constitute one 
household, but the incipient kingdom of heaven. This 
signifies that the commemorative rite was to be removed 
from the guardianship of the household into the open 
air of universal humanity. But there is no intimation 
that any priestly guardianship is to be substituted for 
that of the household. It is still to be a commemora- 
tive feast, to be observed by all the followers of Christ, 
wherever two or three are assembled in his name. 1 

Is it then to be believed that Jesus constituted the 
twelve apostles, with such successors in the apostolic 
office as they should appoint, a perpetual corporation, 
and in such sense committed the guardianship of this 
rite to that corporation, that its benefits can only be 
dispensed to the people by official agents appointed by 
it? This is what is claimed by all those who advocate 
that conception of the church of which the three propo- 



1 Matt, xviii : 20. 



44 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

sitions already enunciated are the fundamental organic 
principles. It was shown in a previous chapter, that it 
is highly incredible, that Jesus committed the perpetual 
government of the church to such a corporation. But 
may it not still be maintained, that, as the twelve apos- 
tles only were present at the institution of the Supper, 
he intended to commit the rite in trust to them and their 
successors forever, to be by them dispensed to the 
whole multitude of his followers ? 

It is a sufficient answer to this question, that no such 
intimation whatever is contained in the language 
employed by Jesus on the occasion. He addressed 
them simply as his followers, without the slightest hint 
that he was investing them and their successors forever 
with the guardianship of this rite, and the official duty 
of dispensing its benefits to his followers. No word is 
reported to have fallen from his lips, which can be tor- 
tured into such a suggestion. Nothing can be more 
certain than that the idea of such a guardianship over 
the rite never could have been derived from the account 
of the institution of the Supper given by either of the 
three evangelists who have recorded it, or from the 
independent account of it given by Paul in his letter to 
the Corinthians. 1 This consideration should settle the 
whole question He who claims that the Founder of 
Christianity committed this rite to the guardianship of a 
perpetual corporation, is bound to show the specific 
grant of power to that corporation in the words of -Jesus 
himself. If no such grant can be shown, the claim is a 
hideous usurpation. 

But we have much stronger proofs to allege than the 
mere absence of such a specific grant. To have com- 
mitted the Lord's Supper to a perpetual corporation to 

1 i Cor. xi : 23-29. 



THE PERPETUAL PASSOVER. 45 

be by them controlled and dispensed to the people 
would have committed to them also all those indefinite 
and unlimited powers for the government of the church, 
the inevitable consequences of which were pointed out 
in a previous chapter. This would be still more espe- 
cially true, if the rite of baptism was in like manner 
committed to the same corporation. It requires no 
argument to show, that if Jesus commanded his follow- 
ers in all ages to observe these two rites, and instituted 
a perpetual corporation through which alone the people 
could obtain the privilege of obeying this command of 
the crucified and risen Master, that corporation would 
govern the church with unlimited powers. It could 
magnify as much as it pleased the importance of these 
rites to the salvation of the individual believer, pre- 
scribe such conditions at its own discretion, by compli- 
ance with which only access was to be gained to these 
rites, and appoint the agents who should be empowered 
to admit to them and exclude from them. A more 
absolute government than this cannot be conceived of. 
Just such an absolute government did the Founder of 
Christianity establish, if he committed the rites of bap- 
tism and the Lord's Supper to the control of a perpetual 
corporation. 

It is true historically, beyond all contradiction, that 
wherever the theory of a perpetual apostolic corporation 
has been received in any age of the world, the body 
claiming to be that corporation has always exercised 
control over the church through the rites of baptism 
and the Lord's Supper. The power of ordination is the 
power to induct men into such an official relation to the 
sacred corporation, as to qualify them to exhibit these 
rites to the people. The power of confirmation is the 
power to open the door to the Lord's Supper. Penance 
and absolution are priestly functions by which the 



46 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

priest opens the door to the Lord's Supper to the peni- 
tent, and shuts it against the impenitent. To that 
same power of opening and shutting, the confessional 
owes all its influence and all its ghostly terrors. Yet if 
Jesus really constituted the perpetual apostolic corpo- 
ration, and committed the Lord's Supper to it, he estab- 
lished and must have intended to establish such a 
despotism over his church in all ages. 

To commit the Lord's Supper to such a corporation 
was to constitute in the church a perpetual priesthood 
with priestly powers more unlimited than any known to 
history. The essential idea of the priesthood is that 
of an order of persons intrusted with powers and func- 
tions of such a character, that no man can obtain the 
favor of God except through the exertion of those 
powers and functions. A priest is essentially a media- 
tor between God and man, through whom alone man 
can approach his God and obtain his favor. The sacred 
apostolic corporation, if constituted by the Master with 
the powers which are assumed for it, was in a pre-emi- 
nent sense a priesthood. Jesus commanded all his fol- 
lowers, " This do in remembrance of me," But when 
men desire to obey that command, they find the table 
of the Lord in the keeping of the apostolic corporation, 
and every avenue to it guarded by the agents whom 
that corporation appoints. They learn from those 
agents that without the observance of those rites they 
cannot be saved, and yet they can observe them only 
by the permission and under the authority of the same 
perpetual corporation. The members of that corpora- 
tion have thus become a universal priesthood, and are 
supposed to exercise unlimited powers, not only over 
the church of Christ, but over the eternal destiny of 
men. In human history, there is no other such priest- 
hood as this. This surely is not the perpetual Pass- 



THE PERPETUAL PASSOVER. 47 

over. With the Passover, no priestly power could 
meddle. It needed no other priest than the father, the 
priest of his own house. But if we are to believe the 
advocates of the perpetual apostolic corporation, Jesus, 
on that same night in which he was betrayed, converted 
that simple domestic feast into the most terrible instru- 
ment of priestly despotism that ever existed on earth. 
It is high time that the followers of Christ should with 
united voice disown and reject an assumption so 
groundless and so hideous. 

The claim is indeed set up by a very high authority, 
that an official priesthood was recognized in the 
churches of the New Testament. It is not agreeable 
to give utterance to a criticism of any portion of a for- 
mula of worship so revered and time-honored as the 
Book of Common Prayer ; but in discussing the subject 
now under consideration, I owe a sacred duty to the 
cause of truth and righteousness, which must be dis- 
charged wherever the censure may fall. The preface to 
the form of ordaining priests, bishops and deacons used 
in the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United 
States of America, commences with the following words : 
"It is evident unto all men diligently reading holy 
Scripture and ancient authors, that from the apostles' 
time there have been these orders of ministers in 
Christ's church, — bishops, priests and deacons." 

It is, I confess, to me a matter of wonder that the 
many really wise and excellent men who adhere to the 
liturgy of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the 
United States can use and publicly recite these words 
without blushing. "It" certainly "is evident unto all 
men diligently reading holy Scripture " that none of the 
officers of the church named in the New Testament are 
ever called priests. The church of the New Testament 
knows and recognizes no such function in any of its 



48 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

officers. There is no hint in any part of the New Tes- 
tament, certainly not in any recorded saying of Jesus, 
that the offering of sacrifices was to constitute any part 
of Christian worship. This was the priestly function. 
The church had therefore no need of any priestly offi- 
cials, and none of its public servants were ever called 
priests. 

If to this it is replied that there are three designa- 
tions of office recognized in the apostolic times, — 
bishops (Zmoxonol), presbyters (TlQ^o^vreQol), and dea- 
cons (/Jidxovoi), and that the early church simply substi- 
tuted the word priest (IeQevg) for presbyter, I have a 
double reply to make to the assertion. No scholar will, 
in the present state of exegetical knowledge, found an 
argument to prove, that three orders of the ministry 
were recognized in the apostolic churches on the use of 
the words "bishop," "presbyter," and "deacon," in the 
apostolic writings. It is evident beyond all contradic- 
tion, that the words "bishop" and "presbyter" are used 
in the books of the New Testament interchangeably, and 
therefore cannot be understood to imply two distinct 
orders of the ministry. That point is so well settled by 
the abundantly expressed judgment even of eminent 
Episcopal scholars, that it is quite superfluous to restate 
the argument. The use of these three words therefore 
in the apostolic writings, can afford no support what- 
ever to the statement quoted above from the Book of 
Common Prayer. 

Again, even if it should be conceded that these three 
words do indicate three orders of the ministry, there is 
still great impropriety in substituting the word "priest" 
for "presbyter," as the name of one of those orders. It 
does great injustice to the New Testament. It throws 
back upon it a use of language unknown to it, and 
which originated in later times, when ideas unknown to 



THE PERPETUAL PASSOVER. 49 

Jesus and his apostles were rapidly creeping into the 
constitution and government of the church. Christian 
ministers may have been called priests in very early 
times, it is not at all important to my purpose to inquire 
how early. It is entirely sufficient that the word " priest " 
is never so used in the apostolic writings, and while the 
Reformed Episcopal Church is engaged in revising the 
Prayer Book, it is to be hoped they will not cease from 
their labors till they have essentially modified the state- 
ment above quoted. This is a point of great impor- 
tance. The fact that the word " priest " is never used as 
a designation of office in the church in any of the books 
of the New Testament is exceedingly significant and 
important. It points with unmistakable meaning to the 
great central truth, both of the Old and the New Testa- 
ments, that the offering up of Jesus the Christ on the 
cross was the end toward which all the sacrifices of the 
Old Testament pointed, and in which they were ful- 
filled. When that great event had been achieved, the 
kingdom of God on earth had no longer any need of 
the priestly function. Jesus the Messiah had assumed 
the priestly office, and offered the one all-sufficient 
sacrifice. His kingly office related to the future. He 
was to govern the church in all ages and lands. But his 
priesthood from the time of the crucifixion was related 
to the past. He entered into the holy of holies and 
accomplished the priestly function once for all. 

Whoever the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews 
may have been, it is impossible to deny the force of his 
argument. The sacrifices of the Mosaic system formed 
an important part of worship, as long as the Mosaic 
institution continued in force. But the whole system 
had its perfect accomplishment in the crucifixion of the 
Messiah. Jesus the Christ absorbed in himself the 
whole priesthood, and offered the one sacrifice for all 
4 



50 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

men. He is still our priest, our high-priest. But it is 
only in view of the sacrifice which has been offered, not 
of one that is to be offered. He makes intercession for 
us forever, but his intercession always looks back to 
Calvary. It is remarkable that the priestly office of 
Jesus, in the same manner as his kingly office, is to be 
shared by all his true followers. In the language of 
the vision of Patmos, he is said to have made us " kings 
and priests unto God and his Father." 1 "And hast 
made us unto our God kings and priests : and we shall 
reign on the earth." 2 Peter speaks of the followers of 
Christ as " an holy priesthood to offer up spiritual sac- 
rifices unto God," and also as a "royal priesthood." 
The meaning of this language is quite obvious. The 
kingdom of God on earth is to be governed by moral 
and spiritual forces. All true disciples are to be asso- 
ciated with Jesus Christ in wielding those forces for the 
reformation and salvation of men. In like manner, 
Jesus exercised the priestly function by offering himself 
a willing victim to the cause of human salvation. In 
this too all his true followers are to share. They are 
one and all to offer themselves living sacrifices unto 
God in the same cause of human salvation. The 
priesthood of his followers is one which cannot be per- 
formed by proxy. No man can be commissioned to 
offer this spiritual sacrifice for his brother. It is the 
consecration of our entire selves to God, even as Jesus 
consecrated himself for our salvation. 

It makes no difference then, when any class of officials 
in the church of Christ were first called priests. It is a 
perversion of language whenever introduced. It is sub- 
stituting a strange dialect for the speech of apostolic 
times, and, as always, the changed form of speech is a 

1 Rev. i : 6. 2 Rev. v : 10. 



THE PERPETUAL PASSOVER. 5 1 

sure indication of the introduction of modes of thought 
new and foreign, and unknown to primitive Chris- 
tianity ; and it is easy to see how the work of corrup- 
tion was proceeding. It is assumed without any 
warrant whatever, that the simple rite of the Lord's 
Supper, instead of being a perpetual Passover, to be 
observed by the disciples of Christ in all their genera- 
tions, without any priestly intervention, is a religious 
rite, committed to the exclusive guardianship of a 
priestly corporation, to be enjoyed by the people only 
as dispensed by them and their successors in office. 
In the hands of such a priesthood, the rite soon loses 
its character of a commemorative feast, and becomes a 
priestly sacrifice. The teaching presbyter soon becomes 
the mediating priest, and assumes the priestly name, and 
by and by, in the progress of the ages, the Protestant 
Episcopal Church in the United States, with all its 
learning and piety, and in face of the intelligence of the 
nineteenth century, assumes and assures us in its 
revered and venerable formula of doctrine and wor- 
ship, that there was an order of priests in apostolic 
times ; and it may be thought great presumption in 
me to call in question the assertion. Then I must 
patiently bear the imputation. 

Priestly assumption went on apace. It was not long 
till every celebration of the Supper became a new offer- 
ing up of Christ in sacrifice for the communicant. The 
priest became empowered to convert the bread and 
wine into the very body and blood of Christ, to create 
that body from the materials that were before him, and 
to offer it afresh for the sins of the people, and the man 
whom the priests debarred from participating in that 
sacrifice could hope for no share in the salvation of 
Christ. He was an outcast, accursed of God. A feel- 
ing of horror comes over us as we think of so terrible 



52 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

a perversion of the simple commemorative feast which 
Jesus instituted on the night in which he was betrayed. 
Yet this very perversion with all that is shocking in it 
is a perfectly natural and even logical consequence of 
the assumption that the Lord's Supper was committed 
to a self-perpetuating corporation, to be dispensed to 
the people only by its authority. 

There is then no difficulty in understanding what 
took place in that upper chamber at Jerusalem on the 
night before the crucifixion. The Passover had com- 
memorated for ages the founding of that national insti- 
tution of religion, by which the great principle of the 
theocracy had been conserved, and the Jewish people 
had been trained for the reception of the Messiah. 
That institution had now accomplished its work and 
was to give place to the Messianic kingdom. Devout 
men would no longer have any need to observe a 
national Passover, but a commemorative feast, celebrat- 
ing in the same spirit the event that was about to lay 
the foundation of the universal kingdom of Christ, as 
the Passover had commemorated the deliverance of the 
people from Egypt and the founding of the Mosaic 
economy. There was need, not of a national, but of a 
universal and perpetual Passover. For this purpose 
Jesus instituted the Supper, not to destroy the law and 
the prophets, but to fulfil them ; not to abolish the 
theocracy, with all the religious freedom of which it had 
been the parent, but to denationalize it, and make it a 
perpetual heritage of all the faithful in Christ Jesus. 
That in doing this, he placed the rite under the perpet- 
ual guardianship of a self-perpetuating priesthood, with 
unlimited powers to make and execute laws for the 
government of this kingdom, is incredible, and the very 
suggestion of such a constitution is shocking. It is 
only wonderful that such an idea can ever have gained 
any currency in the world. 



THE PRIMACY OF PETER. 53 



CHAPTER IV. 

THE PRIMACY OF PETER. 

I think it would be generally admitted by all candid 
persons who regard Jesus as the Messiah, the fulfilment 
of ancient prophecy and the accomplishment of that 
which was the end of the whole Mosaic system, that 
the modes of reasoning employed in the two previous 
chapters are legitimate, and that the considerations pre- 
sented in them are of considerable weight in determin- 
ing the nature of Christ's kingdom, and of that rite 
which, by the admission of all, is the central figure in 
Christianity as an institution. 

It may however perhaps be said with some degree 
of force, that we must after all learn from Jesus him- 
self what institutions he really intended to found and 
perpetuate, and that from his express authority there 
can be no appeal. From this statement of the case, I 
shall be the last to dissent. There are certain reported 
words of Jesus which seem to many explicitly to author- 
ize and require a very different constitution of the 
kingdom of heaven from that which has thus far been 
set forth in these pages, and which therefore demand 
a very candid and earnest examination. The most 
prominent of these is the following : — 

" When Jesus came into the coasts of Caesarea Philippi, 
he asked his disciples, saying, Who do men say that I 
the Son of man am? And they said, Some say that 



54 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

thou art John the Baptist ; some Elias ; and others 
Jeremias, or one of the prophets. He saith unto them, 
But whom say ye that I am? And Simon Peter 
answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the 
living God. And Jesus answered and said unto him, 
Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona : for flesh and blood 
hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is 
in heaven. And I say also unto thee, That thou art 
Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church : and 
the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. And I will 
give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven : and 
whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth, shall be bound in 
heaven ; and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth, shall 
be loosed in heaven." l 

These words seem to me to contain decisive proof of 
that identity of meaning of the two forms of expression 
here used by our Lord, "my church" and "the king- 
dom of heaven," which was assumed in the first para- 
graph of this work. Whether we interpret them in the 
traditional and papal sense, or in the spiritual sense 
advocated in this chapter, it is alike true, that the two 
predictions, that Peter was to be a foundation stone of 
the church, and that he was to have the keys of the 
kingdom of heaven, were fulfilled by the same series of 
events. If I am right in my interpretation, Peter 
became, by the very same acts, the fulfilment of both 
predictions. By his convincing preaching on the day 
of Pentecost, he was constituted a foundation stone of 
the church, and opened the door of the kingdom of 
heaven. 

This should, I think, be accepted as decisive evidence 
that in this conversation, the two modes of expression 
are of the same import. I do not however think it 

1 Matt, xvi : 3-19. 



THE PRIMACY OF PETER. 



55 



would be easy to show, that in all cases of their use, 
they are perfectly synonymous. The word "church" 
is sometimes used to describe the local church, the 
Christian synagogue : the kingdom of heaven, never. 1 
But when the word " church " is applied to the church 
universal, it seems to be quite synonymous with ''king- 
dom of heaven." The latter phrase is sometimes used 
to describe the visible society of those who profess to be 
Christians and wear the badges of discipleship, though 
it may be true that some of them are not true disciples. 
It is so used in the parable of the tares of the field, 
and still more obviously in the parable of the net cast 
into the sea. 2 Neither of these parables can be fairly 
interpreted except on the admission, that the kingdom 
of heaven means that visible society which is composed 
of all those who wear the visible badges of discipleship. 
In the same sense we ordinarily use the word "church," 
when we speak of the universal church as visible in 
this world. Both are also used to describe that invisi- 
ble spiritual society which is composed only of true 
disciples. 3 We may therefore be assured, that in 
assuming that these two expressions are synonymous, 
we incur no risk of any error which can affect our 
argument. 

It must be noticed, that the powers and privileges here 
granted to the apostle Peter are all personal. It seems 
to me, nothing can be more conclusive and satisfactory 
than the comments of Dean Alford on this passage. I 
earnestly advise every reader who has access to that 
excellent commentary, to turn to this passage and read 
what he has said of it. His view seems to me conclu- 



1 i Tim. iii : 15. See Alford in Locum. 

2 Matt, xiii : 24-30, 36, 43, 4-, 4S. 

3 Matt, vi : 3 ; also Heb. xii : 23. 



56 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

sive and exhaustive. Many Protestants, if I mistake 
not, wish in their hearts that Jesus had never used such 
language as Matthew here attributes to him. They 
have a vague feeling, that his words strongly favor the 
belief, that he meant to establish such a hierarchy as 
the Papal Church. There is indeed nothing here 
which can be tortured into any authorization of the per- 
petual apostolic corporation discussed in the previous 
chapters. But the words seem to many to confer on 
Peter the extraordinary powers and prerogatives claimed 
and exercised by the Roman pontiff. Such a view of 
the passage is wholly groundless and unintelligent. It 
is the offspring of superstition. Few recorded utter- 
ances of Jesus afford so strong a confirmation of our 
faith, as these words when rightly viewed. In the first 
place, they are beyond doubt genuine words which he 
really uttered. If they had found their place in Mat- 
thew's Gospel, according to Strauss' mythical theory, only 
after having been transmitted through several genera- 
tions along the channels of common rumor, they would 
never have appeared in their present form. Their 
obscurities would have been removed by explanations 
in accordance with prevailing opinion. Reporters 
would have put their own interpretations upon them. 
Their rough surfaces and sharp angles would have been 
worn away, as the hardest pebbles become smooth by 
the long action of water. I would instantly seize on 
this passage, as bearing unequivocal marks of being a 
historic report of a real conversation. 

Then again they give an exceedingly clear and 
unequivocal statement of the foundation on which the 
church of Christ was to rest. In them it is expressly 
asserted, that Peter, whose name signifies a rock, should 
be a foundation stone of that church. Some Protes- 
tant writers have hesitated to admit that Peter was to 



THE PRIMACY OF PETER. 57 

be a foundation stone of the church, and have sought 
other modes of interpretation. Those modes of inter- 
pretation do not deal fairly with the language. " Thou 
art Peter," that is, a rock, "and on this rock," not on 
some other rock, " I will build my church." It avails 
nothing to the argument that the word translated "rock," 
when applied as Peter's name, is in the masculine gen- 
der, but feminine in the other case. That fact has no 
significancy except that the word, usually feminine, 
when employed as a man's name would naturally have 
a masculine termination. The church is often repre- 
sented, as here, under the figure of a building, a temple 
of the living God. It was to be a living temple built of 
living stones. Peter was to be made a living stone in 
its very foundation. We are also told why he was to 
be such a foundation stone. It was because of his clear 
discernment and bold, strong utterance of that one 
truth, " Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living 
God." That one truth was to be the attractive force, 
or I might more correctly say, the organic force by 
which the whole edifice was to be constructed and 
cemented together for all the ages. The foundation 
of that living temple was to be laid at Jerusalem, 
not many days after the resurrection. It is simply a 
matter of history, that there and then Peter was the 
foremost of the apostles to declare the truth that the 
crucified Jesus was the Christ the Son of the living 
God, proved to be such by his resurrection from the 
dead, and that he had such power in the preaching of 
that truth, that his personality became forever identi- 
fied with the founding of the church of God on earth. 
Every true believer in Jesus is a living stone in the 
structure of that temple. Peter, by his early, bold and 
strong utterance of that organic truth, became a princi- 



58 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

pal living stone in the foundation itself. This and this 
only is the primacy of Peter. 

I cannot forbear remarking as I pass, how conspicu- 
ously the prophetic power of Jesus, and the comprehen- 
siveness of his plan, appear m this very remarkable 
passage. He knew well the great primary fact of his 
Messiahship, though in his humiliation. He had had 
great difficulty in leading his disciples to understand it. 
But his soul was at that moment exultant at the indica- 
tions, that light was dawning on the vision of at least 
one of his disciples. He clearly foresaw the crucifixion, 
the resurrection and the day of Pentecost, and the 
power with which Peter would then and there publish 
the glad tidings, and by so doing lay the foundations 
of his kingdom. 

But it is said, that other powers are conferred on 
Peter in this remarkable passage. What of them ? 
Was not Peter to have the keys of the kingdom of 
heaven intrusted to him ? Does not this imply, that he 
had the power to open and shut the church of Christ to 
whom he would ? Was it not promised to him, that 
what he should bind on earth should be bound in heaven ? 
Does not this imply that if he should hold men fast to 
the penal consequences of their sins, they would be 
held fast in the court of heaven ; and that if he should, 
by absolution, sunder the tie that unites the sinner to his 
punishment, heaven would release him also ? The sen- 
sitive soul is filled with shuddering horror in contem- 
plating the control which frail, erring men, with all the 
weakness and ignorance of our common humanity, have 
affected and been believed to exercise over the everlast- 
ing destiny of uncounted millions of their fellow-mortals, 
under the grant of power which these words have been 
assumed to confer. 

But let the reader attentively consider these words 



THE PRIMACY OF PETER. 59 

again. The interpretation of them to which I refer is 
the result of seeing them only under the sombre shad- 
ows of superstition, as the most familiar objects seen in 
a dense mist are often distorted by a morbid and terri- 
fied imagination into hideous spectres of mystery and 
terror. The words of Jesus confer no power on any 
human being except Peter in person, and contain no 
hint of a promise of like power to any other person 
in that or any future generation. When Peter died, 
these words, whatever their import may have been, had 
spent their force, and their whole meaning had been ful- 
filled. The question of succession to the apostolic 
office will be further examined in another place. It is 
enough for our present purpose, that there is no intima- 
tion here, that Peter was to have any successor to the 
enjoyment of the powers and privileges here conferred 
on him. 

What then were the powers and privileges conferred 
on Peter ? First let us inquire as to the power of the 
keys. How did Peter in his lifetime exercise the power 
of opening and shutting the kingdom of heaven ? The 
answer must readily occur, one would think, to every one. 
He was the first man that ever did open it. He was the 
first to preach, to a listening multitude, a crucified Christ 
risen from the dead. To preach this doctrine is to open 
the kingdom of heaven. All who embrace this doctrine 
enter into the kingdom in the very act of embracing it, 
whether they are met by any official recognition or not. 
The spiritual relation into which they have come to 
Christ is membership of the kingdom, all human power 
to the contrary notwithstanding. If one has not from 
the heart embraced this doctrine, there is no power on 
earth that can bring him into the kingdom. Three 
thousand souls thus entered it through the influence of 
that first sermon of Peter. On that very day, and in 



60 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

the events that followed it, Peter was grandly pre-emi- 
nent among the disciples. He it was of all the twelve 
that had the key, and was mighty to open the door and 
persuade men to enter in. This was the primacy of 
Peter which our Lord clearly foresaw and predicted, as 
he looked forward to the crucifixion and to the results 
which should come from it ; and it was his because of 
his pre-eminence in clear-sighted faith that Jesus was 
the Christ, and his boldness and eloquence in uttering 
it. Jesus was a prophet, and Peter's powerful and con- 
vincing preaching on the day of Pentecost and the 
occasions that shortly followed it, was the fulfilment 
of the prophecy. 

It is also worth while to notice, that Peter was not 
only the first to open the door at Jerusalem, but he was 
also selected to enjoy the honor of opening it to the 
Gentiles. This he did at Csesarea, in the house of 
Cornelius the Roman centurion, after having been 
divinely instructed as to what he was to do by a vision 
from God. The reader should carefully peruse the 
account of this transaction given by Luke. 1 Surely 
Peter was pre-eminently among the apostles intrusted 
with the keys of the kingdom of heaven. As far as we 
are enabled to follow him in the subsequent history, he 
always exhibited the same pre-eminence among his 
brethren, and no other primacy whatever. These and 
like events afford a grand fulfilment of the Lord's 
promise to him, and there is nothing else in his 
recorded life which can be for a moment regarded 
as any fulfilment at all. 

It may be suggested, that the power of the keys 
implies the power to shut up the kingdom of heaven, 
as well as to open it. It may be thought incumbent 

1 Acts x : 1-48. 



THE PRIMACY OF PETER. 6 1 

on me to show how that promise was fulfilled in Peter's 
life. I do not admit that it is incumbent on me, 
in order to sustain the interpretation of the passage 
which I adopt, to show, that Peter ever used the power 
of shutting at all. The fact that Peter possessed and 
exercised the power of opening the kingdom of heaven 
to men in a very remarkable degree, sufficiently justi- 
fies his being represented under the figure of having the 
keys, whether he ever performed the office of shutting 
or not. The mere use of that figure by no means 
implies that he ever did. Yet it is perfectly easy to 
show how he performed the office of shutting, as well as 
of opening. The same proclamation of the joyful news 
of a crucified and risen Christ, which opens the door of 
the kingdom to those who joyfully receive the truth, 
shuts it to all those who reject it. Not only are they 
shut out of the kingdom by the very act of rejection, 
but every man who has had the glad news clearly and 
forcibly set before him, and has rejected it in full view 
of such a presentation, is farther from the kingdom and 
all its blessings than he would have been if it had never 
been presented to him. Resistance to truth and right- 
eousness always blinds the eyes and stiffens the will 
against them. Paul has expressed this truth with great 
clearness and power. " For we are unto God a sweet 
savor in Christ, in them that are saved and in them 
that perish : to the one the savor of death unto death ; 
and to the other the savor of life unto life." 1 Peter did 
then in the very act of opening the kingdom of heaven 
to them that believe, shut it more effectually to them 
that believe not. This is beyond all question the power 
of the keys which our Lord promised Peter. This 
power he possessed and abundantly exerted, and he 

1 2 Cor. ii : 15, 16. 



62 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

neither claimed nor exercised any other. There is no 
reason why any Protestant should for a moment enter- 
tain the suspicion, that there is anything in these words 
which favors the pretensions of Rome. 

It is sorrowful to contemplate the perversions of this 
figure" of the keys which have resulted from super- 
stition and the spirit of ecclesiastical domination. The 
gift of this power, as contained in the words on which 
we are commenting, is peculiar to Peter, only because 
he first used the key in opening the door of the kingdom 
of heaven. This privilege can never be enjoyed by any 
other. But the power of reopening the door is conceded 
to every one according as he sets forth the truth, that 
Jesus is the Christ the Son of the living God. It has 
been imagined by millions, that this power can only be 
exercised by those who are supposed to be officially 
placed over the church of God. No greater delusion 
ever took possession of the minds of men. In the six- 
teenth century for example, it was not Pope Leo X. that 
held the power of the keys for all Christendom, but 
Martin Luther and his fellow-laborers in the work of 
the Reformation, that were opening the doors of the 
kingdom of heaven so long closed by ghostly supersti- 
tion, and opening them, not for that age alone, but for 
all coming ages. All true preachers of righteousness in 
the name of Jesus Christ are pre-eminently invested 
with the power of the keys, and they who profess to 
exercise that power in virtue of their pretended relation 
to a perpetual priestly corporation, have indeed availa- 
ble power to shut the kingdom of heaven against men, 
but none whatever to open it. They have taken away 
the key of knowledge ; they neither go in themselves 
nor suffer them who are entering to go in. 

Nothing has yet been said of the power of binding 
and loosing which was also promised to Peter. This 






THE PRIMACY OF PETER. 63 

phraseology is no less important to a just understand- 
ing of the subject than the gift of the keys. The same 
phraseology occurs in another memorable utterance of 
our Lord, which should therefore be considered in this 
connection. It is as follows : — 

" Moreover, if thy brother shall trespass against thee, 
go and tell him his fault between thee and him alone : 
if he shall hear thee, thou hast gained thy brother. 
But if he will not hear thee, then take with thee one or 
two more, that in the mouth of two or three witnesses 
every word may be established. And if he shall neglect 
to hear them, tell it unto the church : but if he neglect 
to hear the church, let him be unto thee as an heathen 
man and a publican. Verily I say unto you, Whatso- 
ever ye shall bind on earth, shall be bound in heaven : 
and whatsoever ye shall loose on earth, shall be loosed 
in heaven. Again I say unto you, That if two of you 
shall agree on earth, as touching anything that they shall 
ask, it shall be done for them of my Father which is in 
heaven. For where two or three are gathered together 
in my name, there am I in the midst of them." ! 

There is no reason for regarding these words as 
addressed to the disciples in any official capacity. 
Indeed the intercourse between Jesus and his disciples 
is always precisely such as is to be expected between a 
teacher and his pupils. These words were evidently 
intended as rules of conduct to all his followers, in 
whatever condition of life. It was not an apostle, but 
every disciple, to whom it was said, " If thy brother shall 
trespass against thee, go and tell him his fault between 
thee and him alone." If any one, however humble in 
station, by following this rule, persuades his brother to 
repent, he gains his brother, and as completely releases 

1 Matt, xviii : 1 5-20. 



64 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

him from the bonds of iniquity, as the whole church or 
an apostle could. The same is true of the joint action 
of the two or three that should make the second 
attempt, and they might be the obscurest and humblest 
of the disciples. They were net acting in any official 
capacity, but simply as brethren in the Lord. If these 
failed, the person injured must tell it to the church, not 
at all for the purpose of obtaining any authoritative 
decision, but to bring to bear a stronger moral force for 
the accomplishment of the one object of the whole pro- 
ceeding, to gain the brother by persuading him to 
repent. If he heard the church, he would be absolved 
(loosed) precisely in the same manner that he would have 
been if he had yielded to the first admonition. The 
only difference would be, that in the one case the indi- 
vidual brother would have loosed him by his loving 
persuasion \ in the other the whole church would have 
exerted its precisely similar moral influence, to accom- 
plish exactly the same thing. In case of successful 
persuasion, the individual brother had just as much and 
just as valid power to loose him as the whole church. 
In both cases, the power of loosing is simply and only 
the power to bring to repentance by loving persuasion. 
The word IxxXqaia, here translated " church," occurs 
nowhere in the four Gospels, except in this passage and 
that before quoted from the sixteenth chapter of Mat- 
thew. The reason why it does not more frequently 
occur is doubtless to be found in the fact, that the 
existence of particular churches, such as those of Jeru- 
salem, Antioch and Corinth, did not begin till after the 
day of Pentecost. Previous to that time therefore, 
there was very little occasion for the use of the word in 
the strictly Christian sense. Still both Jesus and his 
disciples, and the Jews generally had been accustomed 
to weekly assemblies for worship at the synagogue, and 



THE PRIMACY OF PETER. 65 

we know that Jesus used to attend them. Could we 
see life as it then was in Galilee, I apprehend we should 
be very agreeably surprised to learn how closely it 
resembled, in this respect, what we are familiar with in 
our own times. The people of Galilee were probably 
accustomed to assemble on their Sabbath for religious 
instruction and worship very much as we do. These 
assemblies were in all probability called by the same 
Greek name afterwards used to denote the Christian 
assembly, at least by all who used the Greek lan- 
guage. To this use of the Greek word, or of the corre- 
sponding word in their own vernacular, the disciples 
were doubtless accustomed from childhood, and when 
our Lord used the word on these occasions, they would 
have no doubt of his meaning. Indeed, from the 
history given in the Acts, it is evident that the first 
propagators of the doctrine of Christ never did separate 
their assemblies from those of the synagogue, except as 
such separation was rendered necessary by the opposi- 
tion of unbelieving Jews. They did not regard them- 
selves as teaching a new religion, but the identical 
religion of the Old Testament, interpreted according to 
its true intent and import. It was necessary to make 
this explanation, in order that what follows may be 
better understood. 

Suppose then, that when the offence was told to the 
church, the offender would not hear them, what then ? 
Our Lord explicitly answers, " Let him be unto thee as 
an heathen man and a publican." I cannot call to 
mind the interpretation that has been put on these 
words within my own knowledge and memory without 
great sorrow. Indeed is there not reason to fear, that 
they are still seen through a blinding mist by very many 
readers of the New Testament? The interpretation 
almost universally put on them is, that if the offender 
5 



66 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

will not hear the church, that body is to pronounce 
upon him the sentence of excommunication. This is 
supposed to be essentially implied in the power of the 
keys, and in the power of binding and loosing here 
spoken of. This interpretation certainly cannot be 
maintained. Jesus began by addressing an individual, 
and he continues to address an individual all the way 
through. He tells what that individual is to do in the 
first instance, and what he is to do in case of failure in 
the first instance. He then instructs the same individ- 
ual, that in case of failure in the second instance to 
bring the offender to repentance, he is to tell it to the 
church, still having the same end in view. If the same 
individual cannot succeed in accomplishing the end by 
the aid of the church, our Lord also tells him what he 
is to do in that case. Let him be unto thee (to that 
same individual) as an heathen man and a publican. 
The grammatical structure does not admit of any other 
interpretation. The language does not imply, that the 
church has any function in the premises, except to use 
its influence in trying to gain the offending brother. 
In case of failure to accomplish this, our Lord tells the 
individual what he is to do, but does not tell the church 
what it is to do, or intimate that it is to do anything. 

The error in the case lies in the assumption, that the 
power of the keys and of the binding and loosing here 
spoken of is a power of the church in its corporate 
capacity, and that it is to be exercised by a corporate 
act. While we continue to adhere to that error, we 
shall utterly fail to understand our Lord's words in 
either of these conversations. The dim mists of super- 
stition will still gather around them, and they will seem 
to favor the high pretensions of priestly usurpation. 
They are not corporate or priestly powers, but powers 
possessed according to his measure by every individual 






THE PRIMACY OF PETER. 67 

disciple, to open the kingdom of heaven to men by 
exhibiting to them the crucified Christ, and loosing men 
from the bonds of iniquity by persuading them to repent. 
The full light of the Christian dispensation can never 
shine on the church of God, till this interpretation is 
universally accepted, in place of the arrogant preten- 
sions of ecclesiastical and priestly usurpation. I by no 
means deny, that in a case like the one under considera- 
tion, it is a matter of course that all the members of the 
church who had co-operated in efforts to bring the 
offender to repentance would, in the case of failure, 
approve of the conduct of the offended brother in 
regarding the offender as an heathen man and a publi- 
can, and would themselves so regard and treat him. 
But this follows from the nature of the case and the 
mutual relations of the parties, and not from any eccle- 
siastical powers conferred on the church by these words 
of our Lord. 

Before we leave this part of the subject, it is impor- 
tant to inquire what is the precise thing which the 
offended individual is instructed to do. What is it to be 
as an heathen man and a publican ? Images of horror 
thicken around the mind, as one thinks of the interpre- 
tation put for ages On these words. They have been 
made to imply all the curses of the greater ex-commu- 
nication of the papal church, — curses which have often 
sent terror to the hearts of kings and emperors, and 
made them tremble on their thrones. We never can 
divest these words of these associations, till we admit 
that the power of the keys and the power of absolution 
are not corporate and ecclesiastical, but moral and 
spiritual. These words simply express the relation in 
which the injured brother would stand to t,he offender, 
after the failure of all efforts to reclaim him. He 
would stand related to him just as he did to all heathens 



68 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

and pagans around him, to all who are not Christian 
brethren, because they do not believe in Christ, but are 
to be won to faith and repentance if possible. The 
Master would simply say to such a one, You have done 
what you could to release that man by loving persua- 
sion, both of yourself and your brethren, from the bonds 
of his iniquity. But you have failed, and he therefore 
remains, without any fault of yours, in the bondage of 
his sin. 

From these considerations, we may be perfectly 
assured, that the words of our Lord which we have been 
considering can have no reference whatever to what 
are ordinarily called church censures. Still more may 
we be assured, that the impression upon so many minds, 
that these words of our Lord have any reference what- 
ever to the use of baptism and the Lord's Supper in 
the church, is quite groundless. The keys are not the 
emblem of a grant of power to admit men to these rites 
and to exclude men from them. It would be a suffi- 
cient reason to exclude this interpretation, that, at the 
time when they were uttered, the observance of neither 
of these rites had as yet been enjoined on the disciples, 
and it was therefore impossible that they should have 
understood our Lord as referring to those rites. To 
this however it must be added, that when afterwards 
he enjoined the observance of them, the one just before 
the crucifixion, and the other just after the resurrection, 
he made no allusion, in respect to either of them, to any 
such power of the keys and of binding and loosing. 
The application of this language to express the power 
to admit to and exclude from these rites is entirely a 
matter of conjecture and assumption. But, beyond all 
this it has I trust been made perfectly apparent that 
the spirit of these words admits of no such interpreta- 
tion, that they cannot describe a corporate and admin- 



THE PRIMACY OF PETER. 69 

istrative power, and that their import is entirely moral 
and spiritual, that they express that opening and shut- 
ting of the kingdom of heaven which is accomplished 
by the preaching of the crucified and risen Christ. It 
may be possible to find elsewhere such a grant of power 
to admit to and exclude from participation in these 
rites, but it certainly is not conferred in the words of 
our Lord which we have been considering. 

Besides the two passages quoted in this chapter from 
the Gospel of Matthew, I know not that there are any 
other sayings of our Lord, which have any appearance 
of favoring the idea of an apostolic corporation, for the 
government of the church in all ages. These, it has 
been shown, have that appearance only in consequence 
of glosses foisted upon them in times of ignorance and 
superstition, and long transmitted from generation to 
generation by superstitious awe and terror As soon 
as they are examined in the light of a sound exegesis, 
even by the most eminent Episcopal scholars, one of 
them is found to be a promise made to Peter personally, 
of his eminent usefulness among the apostles as a bold 
and earnest preacher of the glad tidings of Jesus the 
crucified and risen Christ ; and the other is found to be 
a series of practical instructions to every individual dis- 
ciple, as to the manner in which he should proceed, in 
case of being injured or offended by the conduct of any 
one who was recognized as a Christian brother. No 
hint can be found in it of any power conferred on the 
apostles for the' perpetual government of the church, 
not even on Peter for governing it during his own life- 
time. All the powers promised to him were purely 
moral and spiritual, none of them were in any sort 
judicial, legislative or administrative. The church was 
to be organized and bound together only by the moral 
force of faith in the crucified Messiah risen from the 



72 



THE KEYS OF SECT. 



followers in all after times were to succeed to a partici- 
pation with the apostles and with Christ himself in the 
exercise of this moral authority. As there is to be no 
end to the increase of his kingdom, this royal succession 
is to be perpetual, and it is the only royal succession 
which is possible in the kingdom of God. 

The same principles hold in respect to the priestly 
succession. When the Messiah offered up himself for 
the sins of the world on the cross, he absorbed into 
himself the whole priestly function. In virtue of that 
one sacrifice, in which he was both the priest and the 
victim, he became the one only high-priest of all the 
future, not for the purpose of offering any other sacri- 
fice, but because he did there and then offer the one 
sacrifice towards which all priesthood pointed. He 
therefore remains the only priest forever. There can 
therefore be no literal succession to the Christian 
priesthood. But here also there is a spiritual succession. 
The apostle Peter speaks of the followers of Christ as 
" an holy priesthood to offer up spiritual sacrifices 
acceptable to God by Jesus Christ." l The meaning is 
very obvious. As Jesus, the Mediator, wholly conse- 
crated himself to the cause of human salvation, at the 
expense of enduring the -sufferings of the cross, in like 
manner and in a like spirit are all his followers to con- 
secrate themselves to the same cause. To this spiritual 
succession in the priesthood there can be no end. The 
priestly like the royal succession is to be perpetual. 
Jesus hath made all the long succession of his followers 
to be kings and priests unto God forever. 

Is there then a perpetual succession of the apostolic 
office? And if so, what is its nature? Is it official and 
priestly, or moral and spiritual ? In order to answer 

1 I Peter ii : 5. 



THE PERPETUAL SUCCESSION. 73 

these questions, it is necessary to inquire what the func- 
tion of the apostolic office really was. It has been 
shown, I hope, conclusively, that they were not a per- 
petual corporation for the government of the church in 
all ages, and that the Lord's Supper was not intrusted 
to them and their official successors to be dispensed to 
the people. Yet the twelve apostles must have been 
selected by our Lord to perform some exceedingly grave 
and important function in establishing his kingdom. 
We cannot otherwise account for his having selected 
them so early in his ministry, for his keeping them con- 
stantly in his company, and for the care and painstak- 
ing with which he instructed them. What then was that 
function ? This question is of the utmost importance 
to the whole history of early Christianity, and, unless it 
can be definitely answered, our knowledge of the subject 
must be very vague and unsatisfactory. There are two 
portions of the apostolic writings, which answer this 
question as definitely as could possibly be desired. 
One of them is the following : — 

"And he said unto them, These are the words which 
I spake unto you, while I was yet with you, that all 
things must be fulfilled which were written in the law of 
Moses, and in the prophets, and in the psalms, concern- 
ing me. Then opened he their understanding, that they 
might understand the Scriptures, and said unto them, 
Thus it is written, and thus it behooved Christ to suffer, 
and to rise from the dead the third day : and that repent- 
ance and remission of sins should be preached in his 
name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. And 
ye are witnesses of these things." 1 

The other testimony referred to above is the follow- 



1 Luke xxiv : 44-48. 



74 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

"Wherefore, of these men which have companied 
with us, all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and 
out among us, beginning from the baptism of John, unto 
that same day that he was taken up from us, must one 
be ordained to be a witness with us of his resurrection. 
And they appointed two, Joseph called Barsabas, who 
was surnamed Justus, and Matthias. And they prayed, 
and said, Thou, Lord, which knowest the hearts of all 
men, show whether of these two thou hast chosen, that 
he may take part of this ministry and apostleship, from 
which Judas by transgression fell, that he might go to 
his own place. And they gave forth their lots ; and the 
lot fell upon Matthias ; and he was numbered with the 
eleven apostles." x 

In the first of these passages we are explicitly told by 
the Lord himself in his last address to the twelve, just 
before his ascension, what their function was to be. 
After having briefly recapitulated the substance of his 
instructions to them, and the matters of fact on which 
he relied for the establishment and perpetuity of his 
kingdom, he said to them, " Ye are witnesses of these 
things." They were to proclaim that Jesus was the 
Messiah, that he was crucified and rose from the dead, 
and to preach remission of sins in his name among all 
nations, beginning at Jerusalem. This was their func- 
tion. For this he had selected them, and made it the 
leading aim of all his ministry to instruct them and 
qualify them for the performance of it. His influence 
on all the future of the world was to be transmitted 
through these men. Through them the world was to 
be made acquainted with his teachings and his life, and 
especially with the facts of his crucifixion and resurrec- 
tion. He had so trained and instructed them, that they 

1 Acts i: 21-26. 



THE PERPETUAL SUCCESSION. 75 

appreciated what he had said and done and suffered, 
and were qualified to give authentic testimony. They 
were to be original witnesses, in such a sense original, 
that it was for the most part impossible for the world 
ever to know with certainty of the things which related 
to Jesus the Christ, except through their words. We 
have no evidence that they ever did perform any other 
function, and we know that they did perform this in the 
first beginnings of the gospel at Jerusalem, in spreading 
abroad the knowledge of it among the nations, and in 
imparting it to future times, insomuch that all that we 
know of Jesus the Christ has come to us through their 
testimony. 

The passage quoted from the Acts of the Apostles 
assures us, that the apostles themselves had precisely 
this understanding of their function, and is in one 
respect still more specifically to our purpose, inasmuch 
as it informs us that the apostles esteemed it an indis- 
pensable qualification for the apostolic office, that one 
should have companied with them all the time that the 
Lord Jesus went in and out among them, and thus be 
qualified to be with them a witness of his resurrection. 
This inevitably implies that no one could be an apostle 
who could not appear as a personal witness of these 
things. It may be objected to this, that Paul was reck- 
oned an apostle, though he did not embrace the Chris- 
tian faith till some time after the founding of the church 
at Jerusalem. To this I reply, that this objection is 
deprived of all its force by the fact, that Paul did per- 
sonally see the Lord at the time of his conversion, and 
distinctly claims that he derived all his knowledge of 
the doctrine of Christ from direct revelation. " But I 
certify you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached 
of me is not after man. For I neither received it of 
man, neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of 



76 ' THE KEYS OF SECT. 

Jesus Christ." 1 It was then a recognized qualification 
for the apostolic office, that one should have a personal 
knowledge of the doctrine of Christ by direct intercourse 
with Christ himself. 

The nature of the apostolic function, whether as indi- 
cated by the Lord himself in his parting address to the 
disciples, or as understood by the apostles, decisively 
excludes the possibility of any succession. In the 
nature of things, there could be no succession beyond 
that generation of original witnesses of the life, death 
and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The evidence is com- 
plete, that it was the apostolic function to give personal 
testimony of these things. An official apostolic succes- 
sion, much as the idea has figured in ecclesiastical 
history, and conspicuous as is the place which it holds 
in the present organizations of Christendom, is an impos- 
sibility, an absurdity, a contradiction in terms. It 
should be sufficient to induce all candid men to aban- 
don this creation of the imagination in dark and igno- 
rant ages, that Jesus gave no intimation of any such 
official succession in instituting the Supper, or in any 
of his confidential conversations with his disciples. But 
we are not compelled to rest the case on the mere 
absence of any intimation of the perpetuity of the apos- 
tolic office in the church. A definition of the office is 
given with great precision and exactness, which renders 
its perpetuity absurd and impossible. I am perfectly 
aware of the array of ecclesiastical power and ecclesias- 
tical precedent which confronts and resists this conclu- 
sion. But no confidence of assumption, and no array of 
hoary precedents, can stand forever against stern fact 
and sound logical argument. There are Christian men 
and Christian scholars in the nineteenth century who 

: Gal. i : 11, 12. 



THE PERPETUAL SUCCESSION. 77 

do feel the unanswerable force of this argument, and 
know that the assumption of a perpetual apostolic office 
in the church rests on no foundation of fact or argu- 
ment; and they will never lose sight of the facts as 
they stand in the sacred record, or cease to urge them 
upon the consideration of mankind, till they exert their 
legitimate influence on the organizations of Christen- 
dom. If those who pretend to be the successors of the 
apostles in the nineteenth century, can show that, like 
Paul, they have personally seen the Lord, and received 
their whole knowledge of the doctrine of Christ by 
direct revelation from him, then will the validity of their 
claim be reverently admitted. If they cannot show this, 
their pretended apostolic authority will be regarded by 
all scholarly men as' a superstitious delusion, which 
would be pitiable if it were not a shocking usurpation 
in the household of God. 

If they were able even to prove, that, like Paul, they . 
had received a knowledge of these things by the direct 
revelation of Jesus Christ, we could still concede to 
them only those powers and functions which the origi- 
nal twelve exercised. They could, even in that case, 
only be to us witnesses of the life, death and resurrec- 
tion of the Lord Jesus. We could not concede to 
them a power to govern the churches, and to keep in 
their charge the rites of baptism and the Lord's Supper, 
and an exclusive authority to exhibit and dispense them 
to the people, which the original apostles never claimed 
or exercised, unless they could convince us that they 
had themselves received such a grant of powers by 
direct revelation from God. 

Is there then no apostolic succession ? Officially, 
there certainly is none. It is a sickly dream of super- 
stition, from which it is high time the Christian world 
should be awaked. But a perpetual spiritual succession 



78 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

there is, just as in the case of the kingly and priestly 
functions. The apostles were witnesses of these things. 
They were original witnesses, which no one else can be, 
any more than any successor of Peter could be the first 
to open the kingdom of heaven. But all followers of 
Christ can and do give valuable testimony to the Chris- 
tian cause, each one in proportion to the extent of his 
knowledge and experience. All the Christians of the 
apostolic age gave testimony which is of very great 
importance to all subsequent ages, in respect to. the 
fundamental facts of Christianity. Without their con- 
current testimony, that of the apostles would have been 
unavailing. In order to make this point plain it is 
necessary to resort to an illustration. The very hinge 
of the argument for the supernatural origin of the 
Christian religion is the conclusive proof that the cruci- 
fied Christ really rose from the dead. The apostles 
clearly saw the importance of this point to the success 
of their mission, and made haste to select one under the 
guidance of the divine Spirit, who, with them, should bear 
witness to the resurrection, in place of the traitor Judas. 
But it was not enough that this point should be made 
evident to the men of that generation. It was. also 
necessary to transmit that evidence to after ages. How 
could this be done? How can the fact be proved to 
the men of our own time ? It is impossible to retry the 
question on the original evidence. Much of that evi- 
dence was of such a nature, that it could not be trans- 
mitted to any subsequent age, and could therefore 
never be produced in any retrial of the question. To 
all subsequent ages therefore the effect of that evidence 
on the age in which the event occurred comes in the 
place of the evidence itself. What that effect was, we 
learn, not from the words, but from the deeds of the 
vast multitudes who in different countries forsook the 



THE PERPETUAL SUCCESSION. 79 

religion of their fathers, and, in circumstances the mcst 
forbidding, avowed their faith in the resurrection, of 
the crucified Christ. The fact that the testimony of 
the apostles was so received by vast multitudes, not 
only at Jerusalem, but in every part of the Roman 
Empire, is to us a convincing proof, that the witness 
given by the apostles to these fundamental facts of 
Christianity had irresistible force, and could not be 
successfully gainsaid by the numerous active and per- 
secuting enemies of Christianity. Thus the testimony 
to the truth of these things by the thousands who in 
that age embraced Christianity becomes no less impor- 
tant to subsequent ages than the testimony of the 
original witnesses was to that age. The one is an 
indispensable supplement to the other, as a means of 
conveying the Christian faith onwards to after-times. 
In like manner, though not in the same degree, the 
testimony of every age is important to all the ages that 
are to follow. There is need of an unbroken line of 
testimony to convey the faith of Christ down to all the 
future. How much for example is the present age 
indebted, not only to the bold and overpowering argu- 
ment of the leaders of the Protestant reformation, but 
to the testimony given by millions, of the power of that 
argument over their own minds, by their faithful adher- 
ence to the reformation, in face of all dangers and 
conflicts. 

No testimony of the men of the apostolic age could 
add anything to that of the original witnesses, who 
were personally acquainted with the fundamental facts 
of Christianity. If other Christians of that age gave 
testimony which was additional to that of the original 
witnesses, or contradictory of it, such testimony would 
be worthy of no confidence ; for it would proceed 
from persons who had no original acquaintance with 



78 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

there is, just as in the case of the kingly and priestly- 
functions. The apostles were witnesses of these things. 
They were original witnesses, which no one else can be, 
any more than any successor of Peter could be the first 
to open the kingdom of heaven. But all followers of 
Christ can and do give valuable testimony to the Chris- 
tian cause, each one in proportion to the extent of his 
knowledge and experience. All the Christians of the 
apostolic age gave testimony which is of very great 
importance to all subsequent ages, in respect to the 
fundamental facts of Christianity. Without their con- 
current testimony, that of the apostles would have been 
unavailing. In order to make this point plain it is 
necessary to resort to an illustration. The very hinge 
of the argument for the supernatural origin of the 
Christian religion is the conclusive proof that the cruci- 
fied Christ really rose from the dead. The apostles 
clearly saw the importance of this point to the success 
of their mission, and made haste to select one under the 
guidance of the divine Spirit, who, with them, should bear 
witness to the resurrection, in place of the traitor Judas. 
But it was not enough that this point should be made 
evident to the men of that generation. It was . also 
necessary to transmit that evidence to after ages. How 
could this be done? How can the fact be proved to 
the men of our own time ? It is impossible to retry the 
question on the original evidence. Much of that evi- 
dence was of such a nature, that it could not be trans- 
mitted to any subsequent age, and could therefore 
never be produced in any retrial of the question. To 
all subsequent ages therefore the effect of that evidence 
on the age in which the event occurred comes in the 
place of the evidence itself. What that effect was, we 
learn, not from the words, but from the deeds of the 
vast multitudes who in different countries forsook the 



THE PERPETUAL SUCCESSION. 79 

religion of their fathers, and, in circumstances the mcst 
forbidding, avowed their faith in the resurrection of 
the crucified Christ. The fact that the testimony of 
the apostles was so received by vast multitudes, not 
only at Jerusalem, but in every part of the Roman 
Empire, is to us a convincing proof, that the witness 
given by the apostles to these fundamental facts of 
Christianity had irresistible force, and could not be 
successfully gainsaid by the numerous active and per- 
secuting enemies of Christianity. Thus the testimony 
to the truth of these things by the thousands who in 
that age embraced Christianity becomes no less impor- 
tant to subsequent ages than the testimony of the 
original witnesses was to that age. The one is an 
indispensable supplement to the other, as a means of 
conveying the Christian faith onwards to after-times. 
In like manner, though not in the same degree, the 
testimony of every age is important to all the ages that 
are to follow. There is need of an unbroken line of 
testimony to convey the faith of Christ down to all the 
future. How much for example is the present age 
indebted, not only to the bold and overpowering argu- 
ment of the leaders of the Protestant reformation, but 
to the testimony given by millions, of the power of that 
argument over their own minds, by their faithful adher- 
ence to the reformation, in face of all dangers and 
conflicts. 

No testimony of the men of the apostolic age could 
add anything to that of the original witnesses, who 
were personally acquainted with the fundamental facts 
of Christianity. If other Christians of that age gave 
testimony which was additional to that of the original 
witnesses, or contradictory of it, such testimony would 
be worthy of no confidence ; for it would proceed 
from persons who had no original acquaintance with 



8o THE KEYS OF SECT. 

the facts, and were therefore incompetent to testify. 
All which the Christians of that age, other than the 
original witnesses were competent to do, was to give 
assurance by their lives and faithful devotion to Chris- 
tianity, in face of all the persecutions which they en- 
countered, to the convincing power of the Christian 
story as they received it from those who had personal 
knowledge of it. This testimony they abundantly gave, 
and it is an exceedingly important link in the chain of 
evidence. It is not necessary to enter into any argu- 
ment here to show, that the fact that multitudes in that 
age rejected the Christian story, does not neutralize the 
evidence in its favor which arises from the cordial faith 
and earnest Christian lives of those who embraced it. 

In like manner the only function of the witnesses 
who appeared in succeeding ages, was to transmit with 
their earnest indorsement the story which had been 
handed down to them from the original witnesses. If 
they added anything which was not contained in the 
testimony of the original witnesses, it would have been 
worthy of no confidence. It has already been shown 
that there were, not only in the age of the apostles but 
in the ages which immediately succeeded it, powerful 
tendencies to incorporate with the prevalent conception 
of Christianity, ideas derived from the hoary paganism 
from which most of the members of the early church 
had been converted. It is not to be supposed, that 
they were entirely and at once divested of all the ideas 
which they had derived from the religion of their child- 
hood and of their fathers, and brought up to a full 
appreciation of that spiritual system which Jesus founded. 
If therefore we find, in the Christianity of the ages 
that followed that of the apostles, ideas, customs and 
modes of government of which the original witnesses 
to Christianity give us no intimation, the fair inference 



THE PERPETUAL SUCCESSION. 8 1 

is, not that these Christians in the after ages must have 
derived such ideas by tradition from the apostles, but 
that they incorporated them with the new religion 
which they had embraced, from the religion to which 
they and their fathers had been accustomed through 
immemorial ages. In other words, it is far more prob- 
able that Christianity had been corrupted than that 
the original witnesses had handed down to subsequent 
ages, by oral tradition and established custom, things 
of which they had left no trace in their written records. 
Any one who thoroughly appreciates the social state 
which Jesus Christ proposed to found, and is well 
acquainted with the condition of society, and especially 
of morality and religion in the centuries next succeed- 
ing the apostolic age, will be very slow to consent to 
correct or to supplement the former, as represented to 
us by the original witnesses, by any ideas or customs 
derived from the latter. 

Nor is this testimony given alone from each age to 
all succeeding ages. It is given by every individual 
disciple to those of his own time, to the world all 
around him. By nothing is that indifference to the 
spiritual truths with which Christianity deals, which is 
so characteristic of the ordinary course of the world, so 
likely to be overcome, and the attention of men strongly 
turned to spiritual things, as by the earnest words and 
corresponding deeds of Christian disciples, who speak 
what they do know and testify what they have seen. 
The solemn testimony of earnest, honest believers in 
Christ is one of the principal forces by which Chris- 
tianity always makes its way in the world. To be a 
witness to Christian truth is one of the foremost privi- 
leges and duties of every disciple in every age. Thus 
the apostolic function, like the kingly and the priestly, 
is shared by even the humblest disciple. Mrs. Stowe's 
6 



82 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

Uncle Tom, in hopeless slavery on Simon Legree's Red 
River plantation, is a spiritual sharer in each glorious 
apostolic function. He is an apostle of spiritual 
truth. 

The kingdom of heaven is grandly unlike any other 
kingdom. It is in the very highest sense a monarchy. 
The Messiah of God is its supreme ruler and Lord, its 
founder, legislator and judge, and every individual sub- 
ject owes him absolute allegiance. Yet it is the per- 
fection of a republic. The entire administration of the 
government is participated in by every individual citizen 
just in proportion to his knowledge, wisdom and virtue. 
To such a share in the administration every human 
being succeeds in virtue of his becoming a loyal sub- 
ject. This chain of succession can be traced back 
without a wanting link, by the clearest historic evidence, 
to the dim antiquity of the times of the patriarchs. It 
is not lost in the bondage of the Israelites in Egypt. 
It becomes conspicuous in their deliverance from 
Egyptian oppression. It is distinctly traceable amid 
the comparative barbarism and anarchy of the times 
of the judges. It is reaffirmed and re-established in 
the religious monarchy of David and Solomon and 
their royal successors. It is clearly manifested in the 
times of the Babylonish captivity. It survives amid 
the struggles of the true worshippers of God with their 
pagan persecutors after the captivity, and is incorpo- 
rated in the Messianic kingdom, and is made the estab- 
lished order of all succeeding ages. It combines in 
itself a perfect assurance, of the entire loyalty of every 
subject to the kingdom of heaven, with the guarantee of 
his perfect spiritual freedom, and his participation in 
the administration of the government, according to the 
measure of his wisdom and virtue. It is a succession 
which ends not with the present life, but has the promise 



THE PERPETUAL SUCCESSION. 8$ 

of the immortal future. All the faithful disciples of 
Christ are to become kings and priests unto God, and 
reign with him forever. Compared with the grandeur 
of such a succession, all the splendor with which the 
pretended official succession from the apostles has been 
invested becomes poor and contemptible. 



84 THE KEYS OF SECT. 



CHAPTER VI. 

THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH. 

In that venerable formula of faith which has come 
down to us from the early church, known as the Apos- 
tles' Creed, though I think it contains abundant internal 
evidence that it did not originate with the apostles, the 
Christian professes his belief "in the holy Catholic 
Church." The word " catholic " is not found in Scripture. 
It is a generalization not much in the style of Scriptural 
phraseology. It is not even found in some of the ear- 
lier forms of the Apostles' Creed. In that used in the 
church of Rome in the early ages, we have simply " the 
holy church." 1 But the word expresses an article in the 
faith of every intelligent Christian. The kingdom of 
God which Jesus was to found was to be universal, both 
in respect to its exercising dominion over all people, 
nations and languages, and over all the ages of the 
future. The kingdom given unto one like unto the Son 
of man was to be such, that " all people, nations and 
languages should serve him," and his dominion was 
never to pass away. In like manner Jesus himself 
represented the matter. In the parable of the tares of 
the field, " the kingdom of heaven "is represented as 
having "the world for its' field," and its duration was to 
be till "the end of the world." No church can have 

1 Bunsen's Hippolytus and his Age, Vol. XI. p. 21. 



THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH. 85 

any claim to be the representative of this kingdom of 
heaven which is not in both these respects catholic, 
that is, universal. It must recognize as its members all 
the true followers of Jesus the Christ ; and it must 
have endured from the founding of the church at Jeru- 
salem to the present time, and it must have the promise 
and the purpose of perpetuating its dominion while time 
shall last. I devoutly express my faith "in the Holy 
Catholic Church," and I refuse to recognize as catholic 
any upstart organization, either of mediaeval or of mod 
ern ages, or any association of men called the church 
of Christ, however influential by numbers and power, or 
however venerable by antiquity, which does not lovingly 
embrace within itself the entire brotherhood of Christ. 
But it is of incalculable importance to all the disci- 
ples of the one crucified Christ in this age to settle one 
question in respect to it, about which our opinions and 
practices are so greatly at variance, as to present to the 
looker-on a strange spectacle of contradiction and con- 
fusion. In what sense is the church to be catholic ? 
In what does true catholicity consist ? Two concep- 
tions of catholicity are possible, two conceptions of 
that universal dominion which the Son of man was to 
exercise. The one is that it is to be visible, official, 
administrative, organic, with a human head and a per- 
petual human magistracy. The other is that it is a 
moral and spiritual dominion, exercised over men invisi- 
bly by the truth and spirit of God, and rendered visible 
only by the external badges of baptism and the Lord's 
Supper, and the presence of the truth as it is in Jesus 
bearing its appropriate fruits of righteousness. In the 
introductory chapter of this work it was stated, that three 
propositions have been tenaciously held perhaps by a 
majority of those who in different ages have borne 
the Christian name, as undoubtedly sanctioned by the 



86 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

Founder of Christianity. The first two of these propo- 
sitions have been examined in the previous chapters, 
and have been found not only unsustained by any 
authority of the Founder of the church, but to be con- 
tradictory to the spirit and leading aim of his mission to 
this world. It was shown that they originated, not in 
his teaching or example, but in the inability of corrupt 
and superstitious ages to appreciate the spirituality of 
his system. 

The third of these propositions remains to be exam- 
ined. It is, that the whole Christian church or kingdom 
of heaven as Jesus conceived of it was intended to pre- 
sent a visible organic unity, under a government perpet- 
ually administered by a succession of human officials, 
or in other words, that the catholicity of the church was 
to be organic, administrative. It has already been made 
apparent, that Jesus himself never manifested any inten- 
tion of providing for the government of his kingdom by 
a succession of human officials. To what has already 
been said on that subject, it is proper here to add that 
nothing can well be stronger or more decisive than his 
denial of any such intention, when at the interrogation 
of Pilate he said, " My kingdom is not of this world." 
This answer was given in such a spirit as quite to 
remove all Pilate's apprehensions that Jesus was medi- 
tating a kingdom which would be a rival of the universal 
empire of the Caesars. In order to set this matter in a 
clear light, let us suppose that Pilate had understood 
Jesus to admit, that although the kingdom he proposed 
to establish would not interfere with the strictly civil or 
military affairs of the empire, he did intend to establish 
an independent religious sovereignty over the whole 
earth, and to vest the administration of it in the hands 
of a succession of human officials, over the appointment 
of whom the emperor could exercise no authority or 



THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH. 87 

influence, and that that sovereignty would take from the 
empire all its religious functions and exert such control 
over all matters pertaining to religion and morals every- 
where and always, as the bishop of Rome and his suc- 
cessors claimed and exercised a few centuries later, and 
that that religious sovereignty was to be universal and 
perpetual ; if Pilate had so understood him when he 
denied that his kingdom was of this world, would the 
suspicious fears of the Roman governor have been 
quieted by the answer ? Would he have gone out and 
said to the people, " I find no fault in this man " ? 
Would he not rather have instantly ordered him to be 
crucified, without any suggestion from the chief priests 
and scribes ? There is no ambiguity in Jesus' answer 
on this occasion. He undoubtedly meant to be un- 
derstood as denying that he intended establishing 
any sovereignty with an earthly and human administra- 
tion. 

There is no denying that this is the form in which the 
matter was put and left by Jesus himself. But it is 
reasonable to inquire how the apostles understood the 
matter, for they were to be his witnesses. In order to 
answer this question, it is necessary to study the Acts of 
the Apostles, to ascertain what they have said of it, and 
what were their understandings of the Master as indi- 
cated by the manner in which they constituted the 
churches which they organized. This part of the sub- 
ject cannot be understood without noticing the fact that 
the word " church " is used in the New Testament in two, 
and only two senses. It sometimes means the church 
universal, the catholic church, the kingdom of heaven. 
" On this rock will I build my church, and the gates of 
hell shall not prevail against it." " Husbands, love your 
wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave 
himself for it." " For the husband is the head of the 



83 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

wife, even as Christ is the head of the church." l We 
can have no difficulty in such cases as these in under- 
standing by the word " church," not any particular local 
organization, as the church at Jerusalem, the church at 
Antioch, the church at Corinth, but the church universal, 
the kingdom of heaven. 

The other sense in which the word "church " is used is 
to describe a local society of believers in Christ, united 
together for purposes of mutual edification and co-oper- 
ation in the work of the Lord. The organization of 
such societies is not a matter of direct and specific com- 
mand, nor do we anywhere find a prescribed constitu- 
tion, according to which they were to be organized. 
As a matter of fact, such societies came into existence 
wherever the gospel was preached and converts were 
made. They sustained precisely the same relation to 
the church universal, the Christian institution, that the 
synagogues did to the system instituted by Moses. 
They were not divinely appointed as a part of the insti- 
tution, and exercised no control over the rites, ceremo- 
nies or priesthood of the Jewish religion. They grew 
out of the conscious wants and social instincts of a 
devout, God-fearing people, and at the time of the 
Christian era seem to have existed wherever there were 
settlements of devout Jews. 

In like manner and by a like universal necessity, the 
ecclesiae of Christians grew up everywhere, as soon as 
there were converts, often in the Jewish synagogue 
itself. If a person embraced Christ in any part of the 
world, he would feel an intense longing for the acquaint- 
ance and society of other disciples of Christ ; and as 
soon as he found such he would permanently associate 
himself with them, by a spiritual instinct as strong and 

1 Eph. v : 23-32. 



THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH. 89 

universal as that by which human beings organize 
human society. These local societies are not otherwise 
of divine appointment than that the spiritual instincts 
from which they originate are the fruits of the Spirit. 
In order to understand the constitution of the apostolic 
churches, and rightly to infer from it their understand- 
ing of the divine conception, we must inquire how these 
churches stood related to each other and to the church 
universal, and what was their internal constitution, or as 
it is commonly called, discipline. 

We must look for the answer to the first of these 
inquiries to the testimony of these apostles themselves, 
and not to the usages of any subsequent age. It will 
be proved in subsequent chapters, that at a»very early 
period after the death of the apostles the constitution 
of these churches underwent great and very important 
changes, and that consequently we cannot infer the 
constitution of the apostolic churches from what existed 
in those subsequent ages. 

From the day of Pentecost onwards, it is evident that 
the apostles and early converts understood him. We 
never hear anything more from them about "restoring 
the kingdom again to Israel," or establishing any other 
sovereignty in human hands. But the men of that age 
were not able to appreciate the conception of a purely 
moral and spiritual authority, which was to be universal 
and perpetual. Soon the idea of a temporal and earthly 
organization of the kingdom of heaven again took pos- 
session of men's minds, and began to modify the gov- 
ernment of the church. One of the most profound 
generalizations of the French political philosopher De 
Tocqueville is the following : — 

" Every religion is found in juxtaposition to a politi- 
cal opinion, which is connected with it by affinity. If 
the human mind be left to its own bent, it will regulate 



90 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

the temporal and spiritual relations of society upon one 
uniform principle ■ and man will endeavor, if I may use 
the expression, to harmonize the state in which he lives 
upon earth, with the state he believes to await him in 
heaven." 

This generalization is as just as it is profound. The 
effort of the human mind to harmonize the temporal 
and the spiritual will sometimes employ itself in modify- 
ing the one, and sometimes the other, according to the 
circumstances in which the desired adjustment is to be 
made. If one of the elements to be harmonized is 
rigid and intractable, and the other pliant and ductile, 
aP the changes will be made at the expense of the lat- 
ter. In that age, nothing on earth was so rigid and 
iron-bound as the mighty structure of Roman civil and 
military polity. Christianity on the contrary, in all that 
respected its organization, was in the very gristle of its 
infancy. In the effort therefore to bring the political 
and religious systems that prevailed in the empire into 
harmony, all the changes were sure to be effected at the 
expense of the latter. Add to this consideration the 
fact, that the churches were chiefly composed of converts 
from the old paganism of the Greeks and Romans, to 
whom religion had been from immemorial ages alto- 
gether an affair of the state, and who were therefore 
accustomed to religious forms that were prescribed and 
regulated by public authority. They had nominally 
renounced paganism and joined themselves to the 
Christian church. But they had necessarily brought 
many of their pagan ideas with them, and were ready to 
see with pleasure many of the forms and customs of 
their childhood incorporated into the new religion which 
they had adopted. If to this we add the fact, that for 

1 Democracy in America, Reeves's translation, page 281. 



THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH. 9 1 

ages the mind of the whole empire had been dazzled 
with the splendid conception of one vast political power, 
incomparably the grandest that had ever existed in the 
world, we shall be quite prepared to understand, that 
there was throughout the empire a powerful tendency to 
commit the government of the church to persons invested 
with authority to rule, and to centralize that authority 
as much as possible after the pattern of the great cen- 
tralized system by which the empire was governed. 
While therefore in endeavoring to ascertain how the 
Founder of Christianity intended to constitute the church, 
it is perfectly reasonable to inquire how. the apostles to 
whom he committed the matter understood his inten- 
tions, and to examine the organizations which they 
established as indicating what their understanding was ; 
it is most unreasonable to expect to find, in the ages 
which followed the death of the apostles, any trust- 
worthy models either of faith or organization. We 
might as well look to the times of Trajan and the 
Antonines for a model of the Roman republic, as to the 
church of their times for the constitution which the 
Founder intended. The church, as we find it delineated 
in the acts and the letters of the apostles, is undoubtedly 
indicative of their understanding of the Master's inten- 
tions. It is therefore most important to the purpose we 
have in hand carefully to examine the churches they 
founded, and the constitutional principles which they 
promulgated. 

The foremost fact that meets us in such an examina- 
tion is the entire absence of any official centralization. 
The local Christian societies which the apostles founded 
were independent communities. On this point I have 
the pleasure of citing the authority of Archbishop 
Whately. His statement of the case is as follows : — 

" It appears plainly from the sacred narrative that, 



9 2 



THE KEYS OF SECT. 



though the many churches which the apostles founded 
were branches of one scriptural brotherhood, — though 
there was ' one Lord, one faith, one baptism ' for all 
of them, yet they were each a distinct, independent 
community on earth, united by the common principles 
on which they were founded, and by their mutual agree- 
ment, affection and respect, but not having any one 
head on earth, or acknowledging any sovereignty of one 
of the societies over another." 1 

I know but one mode of escaping from this conclu- 
sion. It is to maintain that, though each of the churches 
founded by the apostles had a distinct and separate 
corporate existence, they were united into one organic 
whole by the system of General Councils. I find such 
a claim actually set up, and it is said the first General 
Council was held at Jerusalem, in apostolic days, and 
with full apostolic sanction and participation. Arch- 
bishop Whately shall dispose of this matter for us. He 
says : — 

" And as for the so-called General Councils, we find 
not any mention or allusion to any such expedient. 
The pretended first council at Jerusalem does seem to 
me a most extraordinary chimera, without any warrant 
whatever from sacred history." 2 

The facts upon which the claim is set up that a Gen- 
eral Council of the church was held at Jerusalem in 
apostolic times are as follows : 3 Certain men who came 
down to Antioch from Judaea taught the disciples, many 
of whom were Gentiles, that they could not be saved 
unless they were circumcised after the manner of Moses. 
As the gospel had originated at Jerusalem, persons 
coming from thence and claiming to represent the views 

1 Kingdom of Christ Delineated, Essay II., Sect. 15. 

2 ibKl. 3 Acts xv. 



THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH. 93 

which prevailed there, would naturally have great influ- 
ence, especially as that was still the place of residence 
of most of the original witnesses to the fundamental 
Christian facts, and the chief seat of the Christian 
mission. Considerable discussion having been occa- 
sioned at Antioch by the teaching of these men, it was 
determined to send Paul and Barnabas and certain 
other brethren to Jerusalem, to consult the apostles and 
elders there about the matter. 

It is obvious, that there is no ground for pretending 
that this was a General Council of the church. Nobody 
was consulted but the apostles, elders and brethren of 
the church at Jerusalem. No delegates were present 
from other churches, except the men who were appointed 
by the church at Antioch to go up to Jerusalem and ask 
advice about the matter. Advice was not asked from a 
council of the church universal, but from the apostles, 
elders and brethren of the one church at Jerusalem. 
Those who were consulted claimed no authority what- 
ever over the churches. In the document which they 
put forth, they distinctly assign the reason which induced 
them to give their advice in the case, in these w r ords : 
" Forasmuch as we have heard that certain who went 
out from us have troubled you with words subverting 
your souls," etc. It was to undo the mischief which 
certain who went out from them had clone. The case 
was as though persons should go from this country to 
some American missionary station in a pagan land, and 
should so represent the views of the Christian people 
of this country to a group of converts from heathenism, 
as to produce dissension and much trouble. The mis- 
sionaries would naturally enough seek to remedy the 
evil by sending back to this country, to Boston, if you 
please, if that was the place from which the mission- 
aries were sent out, some of their own number, accom- 



94 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

panied by some of their heathen converts, to lay the 
matter before the friends and promoters of the mission 
in that city, and obtain from them a correct statement 
of their views, to be reported back to the converts from 
heathenism. Could anything be more absurd than to 
represent this as a General Council of Christendom ? 
Yet it would be precisely like this pretended General 
Council at Jerusalem. It 'is, as Archbishop Whately 
says, " a most extraordinary chimera." The whole 
system of General Councils for the government of the 
church universal rests on no other foundation than this 
chimerical pretension There is no other hint in the 
apostolic writings, that a system of centralizing the church 
by General Councils existed, or had ever been thought 
of, in the apostolic age. 

Some may be disposed to attach importance to the 
fact that the instrument of writing which was sent out 
from the consultation speaks of the results arrived at as 
doypara, " decrees." The word might with equal pro- 
priety have been translated "resolutions." It means 
the results of deliberation, common opinions arrived at 
by consultation, and has no reference whatever to any 
claim of authority over the churches. Neither is it any 
evidence of the authoritative character of this document 
that Paul and Silas carried it with them in their mis- 
sionary journeys, and delivered it to the Christians to 
keep or observe. In the regions through which they 
travelled, converts were likely to be made both from 
Jews and Gentiles, and the same dissensions were likely 
to arise, which had arisen at Antioch. The opinions of 
the apostles, elders and brethren at Jerusalem would 
have weight elsewhere for the same reasons as at Anti- 
och. They would be likely to dissuade Jewish converts 
from insisting on the observance of the Mosaic rites by 
converts from among the Gentiles, and to convince the 



THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH. 95 

y 

Gentiles that those rites were not obligatory on the 
Christian disciples. The document was important on 
account of its moral authority among the converts, and 
the use of it as a means of preserving harmony does not 
imply that it was regarded as an edict of a body claim- 
ing the right to govern the churches. 

It may still be claimed however, that the apostolic 
churches were united into an organic whole by the sub- 
jection of them all to the government of bishops. This 
point therefore requires to be examined. That there 
were official persons in those churches who were some- 
times called bishops (' Ema-Aonoi) is certainly beyond con- 
troversy. Whether this would imply that the churches 
were under a centralized government having jurisdiction 
over them all must depend on the functions of those 
officers called bishops. When we read in a document 
of a former age a word with which we are perfectly 
familiar, and which bears in our own age a well-under- 
stood meaning, we are apt to assume, that it had, at the 
time when the document was written, the same meaning 
which it has in our own times. This is a fertile source 
of error in the interpretation of all writings which have 
come down to us from former ages, and of the Scrip- 
tures not less than of other writings. The difficulty is 
aggravated in the case of the Scriptures by the fact, that 
we know them chiefly through translations of compara- 
tively recent origin. The translator is always liable to 
be misled by his own peculiar theories and those of his 
sect or party, so that the translation will express, not the 
uncolored results of impartial scholarship, but the dis- 
tortions of partisan opinion. Certainly the times when 
King James's version was made were not such as to give 
any absolute assurance of entire exemption from such 
influences of partisanship. 

In introducing the examination of this matter, I have 



9 J THE KEYS OF SECT. 

great pleasure in stepping aside for a few moments, while 
the reader attends to the view of this subject presented 
by the late honored and lamented Henry Alford B. D., 
Dean of Canterbury. They will be found in his com- 
mentary on the following words : " This is a true saying, 
if a man desire the office of a bishop, he desireth a good 
work." 1 He heads his comments on the paragraph of 
which these are the opening words thus, — " Precepts 
respect'mg overseers (presbyters)," thus making overseers 
(bishops) perfectly synonymous with presbyters. A lit- 
tle further down he says, " It is merely laying a trap for 
misunderstanding to render the word (emaxomfi), at this 
time of the church's history, 'the office of a bishop.' 
The smsAOTtoi of the New Testament have officially 
nothing in common with our bishops." Such an opinio*: 
as this from so eminent an Episcopal scholar as Dean 
Alford might well be regarded as decisive. The severe 
criticism of the translation, the reader will observe, is his, 
not mine. 

If it could be shown that the bishops mentioned in 
our translation of the New Testament had the same 
functions that are claimed and exercised by an Anglican 
or Roman Catholic diocesan bishop of the present time, 
then it would follow, that the government of the apostolic 
churches was centralized by the authority of the bishops. 
But according to Dean Alford, this is so far from being 
true, that officially the two had nothing in common. I 
am persuaded that the most careful and thorough exam- 
ination of the functions of the officers called bishops in 
the New Testaments will show, that this assertion is 
absolutely true. Such an examination I purpose now 
to institute. The principal functions of a modern bishop 
are, to invest the clergy with official power to exhibit 

1 I Tim. iii : i. 



THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH. 97 

what are called the " sacraments " of baptism and the 
Lord's Supper, and to admit persons to participation in 
these sacraments by the rite of confirmation and abso- 
lution. There is no evidence whatever that either of 
these functions was known or thought of in the times of 
the apostles. 

It has already been shown, that no recorded saying 
of Jesus himself contains any hint of a grant of power 
to dispense the privilege of participating in the rites of 
baptism and the Lord's Supper to the people. But it is 
wonderful how deeply the idea has penetrated the minds 
of the Lord's people in nearly all the Protestant com- 
munions, even, that these rites are sacraments, and must 
be administered by a clergy qualified to perform this func- 
tion by the laying on of hands in ordination. Within my 
own knowledge and distinct recollection, so thoroughly 
have the minds of Presbyterians and Congregationalists 
been imbued with this idea, that it was regarded as a 
sort of sacrilege for one who had not received ordina- 
tion to break the bread and pour out the wine of the 
Lord's Supper, and deliver them to the people. Did this 
view of the subject prevail in the apostolic churches ? 
Who can place his ringer on any passage of the New 
Testament which contains the slightest hint that it did ? 
Where is the proof that, in any case in which ordina- 
tion by the laying on of hands is spoken of, the parties 
engaged in the transaction understood that it conferred 
authority not otherwise possessed to administer baptism 
and the Lord's Supper ? In what instance of the bap- 
tism of a convert or of the breaking of bread in the 
name of the Lord, is it implied, that the administration 
of an ordained minister was necessary to the validity or 
the propriety of the transaction ? One will search the 
apostolic records in vain for a single example. The 
idea of a clergy empowered by ordination to administer 
7 



98 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

the sacraments of baptism and the Lord's Supper with 
validity or propriety is not in the* New Testament, except 
as it has been thrown back upon it, and interpreted into 
it, from customs and practices which originated in sub- 
sequent ages. Neither is the idea of a sacrament to be 
administered found in the New Testament. The Lord's 
Supper of the New Testament is a commemorative feast, 
to be perpetually observed in all the generations of the 
Lord's people in grateful remembrance of the crucified 
Christ. 

It may be said, it will be felt by many that read these 
paragraphs, that this is taking from the Lord's Supper 
all its sanctity. I beg them to pause and consider 
their words. I feel the sanctity of that holy observance 
no less than they. But its sanctity does not lie in the 
awe-inspiring superstition of a priestly function to give 
it validity, but in the sacred memories of Gethsemane 
and Calvary which have been associated with it for 
more than eighteen centuries, and which carry me back 
to that night when, in sharp conflict with all the pow- 
ers of darkness, Jesus Christ won the victory forever. 
Away, ye profane ! Let no priestly functionary intrude 
his manipulation between any two or three disciples 
assembled in the name of the Lord, and a suffering 
triumphant Christ. I have often observed the Lord's 
Supper with Christian brethren commonly called Camp- 
bellites, from their closely following the late Alexander 
Campbell. They are accustomed to observe the Supper 
at the close of the service on each Sabbath morning. 
They do not recognize the necessity of any clergy, 
qualified by ordination to administer either baptism or 
the Lord's Supper. Any brother of the church may, 
by the invitation of his brethren, preside at the table 
and distribute the bread and the cup. Yet I do not 
remember to have seen the Supper observed with more 



THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH. 



99 



solemn reverence or more fervent devoutness than 
among these brethren. It certainly cannot be denied, 
that, in the early history of the churches of this connec- 
tion, there were some extravagances which cannot be 
commended ; but it cannot be maintained that their 
practices in respect to the Lord's Supper are of this 
character. Good men are generally agreed, that while 
continuing in those practices, they are rapidly growing 
in devoutness and spiritual power. 

I am quite willing to argue this question, but there 
is really very little to argue about. As soon as we 
inquire for the proof that there was an ordained clergy 
in the apostolic churches, according to our ideas of 
ordination, the proof vanishes. We look where we 
expected to find it, but it is not there. We thought it 
was Scriptural ; it proves to be traditional. There is, 
however, one ground of argument which must not be 
overlooked. It is claimed that the apostles did ordain 
presbyters in particular churches, and that Paul gave 
instructions to Timothy and Titus about doing the same 
thing. This matter, then, requires examination. 

One of the most important instances adduced is 
taken from the missionary journey of Paul and Barnabas 
in Asia Minor. " And when they had ordained them 
elders (presbyters) in every church, and had prayed 
with fasting, they commended them to the Lord on 
whom they believed." 1 It is obvious that the apostles 
must have sustained peculiar relations to the churches 
they gathered in the midst of the darkness of paganism, 
and that they must have exercised at first a great deal 
of watchful care over all their internal arrangements. 
Not to have done so would have been most culpable 
negligence. One of the objects of this care would 

1 Acts xiv : 2-. 



IOO THE KEYS OF SECT.' 

surely be, to see to it that suitable men were selected 
and intrusted with the spiritual care and oversight of 
the whole brotherhood. The fact that they exercised 
a great deal of influence over this matter would cer- 
tainly not prove, that it was their intention to establish 
a perpetual class of officers, who should have perma- 
nent oversight of the churches. In the example above 
quoted, our translation represents them to have " or- 
dained elders in every city." The wcrd here trans- 
lated " ordained " (jEiQorov'/jGavrss) does not and cannot 
mean the laying on of hands as in ordination. 1 I can- 
not help suspecting that the rendering of this word 
''ordained" might be justly characterized in the words 
of Dean Alford on another place,, as " laying a trap for 
misunderstanding." The word means "appointed by 
suffrages." 2 The information which we get from the 
passage is, that as the two missionaries went from place 
to place, they procured the election, by the vote or the 
lifting up of the hands of the brotherhood, of elders in 
every city. It is very probable that these appointments 
were made by the nomination of Paul and Barnabas. 
In that way they would' procure the appointment of the 
men whom they thought fittest. In this case there 
is no intimation that the transaction was accompanied 
by the laying on of hands. Nothing can be more 
groundless than the assumption, that in this progress 
among the churches, Paul and Barnabas ordained clergy- 
men in every city vested with authority to administer 
baptism and the Lord's Supper. The idea originates 
from no hint in this passage, but is interpreted into it 
from some other quarter. All which we can learn from 
these words is, that Paul and Barnabas acted just as 



1 Alford's Greek Testament, Acts xiv: 23 

2 Dean Alford on the place quoting Erasmus as authority. 



THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH. IOI 

any wise and faithful missionaries would act, in provid- 
ing for the spiritual care and edification of their converts. 
It is probable however that those who believe that 
the apostolic churches were centralized by the govern- 
ment of bishops would attach still greater importance 
to the instructions given by Paul to Timothy and Titus. 
To these therefore let us give our attention. The 
remark should first be made, that these two men were 
fellow-laborers of Paul, the one at Ephesus, and the 
other in the island of Crete ; and that on Paul's depart- 
ure from these fields of labor respectively, he left them 
in charge of certain matters pertaining to the welfare 
of the churches, which had not been fully arranged. 
In the case of Titus the impression is clearly made on 
the mind, that the charge was temporary, merely to 
complete certain arrangements which had been begun 
but not completed under Paul's own superintendence. 
One of the principal things mentioned is, to "ordain 
elders in every city." So our translation has it. But 
I fear we have again " the laying of a trap for misunder- 
standing." The word translated "ordain "is not the 
word which signifies the laying on of hands, but 
xaraGT^ot^, and signifies to constitute or appoint. The 
mode of appointing is very likely to have been that 
used by Paul and Barnabas in the churches of Asia 
Minor. There is no hint of any reference in this case 
more than in that, to ordination by the laying on of 
hands. It was appropriate that Paul should give in- 
structions to Titus respecting the selection of suitable 
persons, because it is highly probable the appointments 
were made by his nomination. It is also very worthy 
of note, that while the business Titus was left in charge 
of was the appointment of elders (presbyters), Paul pro- 
ceeds to give him instructions about selecting bishops 
(kmoxtmoi), showing beyond the possibility of mistake, 



102 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

that, in Paul's understanding of the matter, the words 
"presbyter" and "bishop" designate the same office. 
Nothing can be more groundless than either the assump- 
tion that Titus wis the diocesan bishop of Crete, or that 
he ordained elders according to the modern import of 
ordination. 

The charge given by Paul to Timothy was certainly 
not diocesan, whatever else it may have been. It had 
exclusive reference to the church at Ephesus. 1 It is 
admitted that reference is made in this epistle to the 
laying on of hands, as a mode of setting apart church 
officers to their proper work, and that Timothy was 
expected to take part in that transaction, and to exert 
an important influence in selecting those who should 
be designated to the care and oversight of the Ephesian 
church. No candid man will deny this, and I can see 
no reason why the most zealous anti-prelatist should 
wish to deny it. He will not wish to deny it, if he 
understands the real state of the argument. It is plain 
from several allusions to the subject which occur in 
different parts of the apostolic writings, that in those 
times the laying on of hands might be practised, when- 
ever persons were designated to any important service 
in the church, whether temporary or permanent. Thus 
the brethren of the church at Antioch were instructed 
of the Holy Ghost to separate Barnabas and Paul to 
the work whereunto the Spirit had called them. That 
work was the preaching of Christ among the Gentiles. 
"And when they had fasted and prayed, and laid hands 
on them, they sent them away." s It is also apparent 
that Timothy was set apart to the charge which he held 
"by prophecy, with the laying on of the hands of the 
presbytery." Both in the case of Paul and Barnabas 

1 i Tim. iii : 15, Dean Alford's comments. 2 Acts xiii : 1-3. 



THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH. 103 

and of Timothy, the designation was made by prophetic 
intimation. The laying on of hands followed. Whose 
hands were laid on Paul and Barnabas is not very 
apparent, though it does appear who the prophets were 
by whom they were designated. But the gift or charge 
was imparted -to Timothy with the " laying on of the 
hands of the presbytery." I have the authority of 
Dean Alford for saying, that by the presbytery is meant 
the eldership of the church at Ephesus, 1 or of some 
other particular church. Indications are abundant, that 
no distinction whatever was made between the laying 
on of the hands of the bishop and of the presbyters. 
In the Second Epistle to Timothy, Paul speaks of the 
gift of God having been conferred on Timothy through 
the laying on of his (Paul's) hands. 2 This may indicate 
some other gift bestowed on Timothy in connection 
with the laying on of hands ; or it may mean that Paul 
himself participated in the laying on of hands spoken 
of in the first epistle. There is no room whatever for 
the pretension, that there was any order of official per- 
sons in the apostolic churches, who possessed the exclu- 
sive power of conferring the gift of God by the laying 
on of their hands. But most of all, there is the entire 
absence of any proof that the apostles ordained in the 
churches a clergy, who derived from that ordination 
the power to exhibit the rites of baptism and the Lord's 
Supper. It- is easy to prove, that they were at great 
pains to provide for the spiritual care and oversight of 
the churches which they formed. It is plain that Titus 
was left in Crete chiefly to provide for that very inter- 
est.. It is equally obvious that Timothy had a very 
important charge in the church at Ephesus, and that he 
was expected to exert in designating the officers of the 

1 AlforcFs Greek Testament, 1 Tim. iv : i.t. - 2 Tim. i: 6. 



104 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

church a very important influence, and in inducting them 
into their offices. More than this these two "epistles do 
not prove in respect to the matter under consideration. 

It is also highly probable that the respective charges 
of Timothy and Titus referred to in these epistles were 
not permanent, but temporary and exceptional. He 
who assumes the contrary does so without any warrant. 
In respect to Titus, such was very certainly and obvi- 
ously the fact. Paul was hurried away to other fields 
of labor, and Titus was left behind, to complete certain 
arrangements which Paul had contemplated, but had 
not finished. In respect to Timothy, it is highly proba- 
ble that the same was true, and his charge was only to a 
particular church. These two epistles therefore afford 
no ground even for the conjecture, that the apostolic 
churches were governed by the centralized authority of 
diocesan bishops. 

That centralization of the government of the churches 
which in after ages subverted the local autonomy of 
apostolic times resulted very largely from the fact, that 
the principle was early assumed, that a bishop could 
only be ordained by bishops. As there was but one 
bishop in each congregation, it was necessary that the 
bishops of several congregations should participate in 
the transaction. This created a necessity for councils 
of bishops, and these councils soon began not only to 
claim the exclusive right of ordaining bishops in the 
several churches, but of exercising a legislative authority 
over them. Such an episcopate was destructive of local 
automony, but not the episcopate which was recognized 
by the apostles. Dean Alford has made it plain in a 
passage just referred to, that such bishops as Paul wrote 
to Timothy about were ordained by the presbytery of 
the local church. Such an episcopate was perfectly 
consistent with local independency. 



THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH. 105 

Another function of the modern diocesan bishop is, 
by the rite of confirmation, to admit persons to the 
Lord's Supper. That persons were so admitted to the 
apostolic churches, and that to admit them was the 
exclusive function of a diocesan bishop, is an assump- 
tion sanctioned by no hint of the apostolic records, and 
in palpable contradiction to the impression which those 
records make on the unbiassed reader. I know of no 
single passage which seems to contain any hint of the 
existence of such a practice. The Holy Ghost is in- 
deed said to have been conferred by the laying on of 
the apostles' hands, as in the case of Peter at Samaria. 1 
But the Holy Ghost was sometimes given without the 
laying on of hands, as in the case of the persons assem- 
bled at the house of Cornelius. While Peter was yet 
speaking, he was surprised that the Holy Ghost descended 
jon his hearers. 2 The principles of interpretation which 
would make episcopal confirmation out of such examples 
as these can make anything out of anything. Yet it 
must be made out of such examples as these, or not 
derived from the apostolic records. Some may be dis- 
posed to claim that another function of diocesan bishops 
was to authorize men to preach the word and interpret 
the Scriptures. But such a claim is too obviously 
groundless to require any argument. The prophetic 
function came down to the apostolic churches from the 
ancient dispensation in all its fulness. Particular assem- 
blies of Christians might certainly select for their relig- 
ious teachers those whom they judged best qualified to 
promote edification. But this does not hinder that all 
may, as they have opportunity, speak all the truth of 
God that is in them ; and the idea of a class in the 
church exclusively charged with the function of uttering 

1 Acts viii : 17. 2 Acts x : 44. 



106 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

God's truth in this world is in contradiction to the whole 
tenor and spirit of the religion of the Bible from the 
days of the patriarchs till now. It is accordant with the 
ordinances of God in every age in which he has revealed 
himself to men, that men to whom he has revealed in 
any way his truth and his will may utter them to any 
assemblage of their fellow-men that will' hear them, 
whether in the wilderness of* Judaea or in the temple at 
Jerusalem, whether beneath cathedral domes or under 
the open arch of heaven. 

I come therefore to the conclusion that there are in 
the apostolic records ro indications whatever that the 
churches founded by the apostles were centralized under 
the government of an order of diocesan bishops. There 
are not only no traces of the existence of such bishops 
in those churches, but the functions which they perform, 
and for which only they exist in modern times, did not. 
exist in the churches of the apostles, and were unknown 
in those times. The impression that those functions 
did exist and are recognized in the apostolic records 
cannot be derived from the records themselves, but has 
been thrown back upon them and interpreted into them 
from more recent ages. If any one is shocked at this 
conclusion, and I am painfully aware that many will be, 
I entreat such a one, to consider why he is shocked. Is 
it on account of his reverence for Jesus Christ and the 
recorded testimony of his apostles, or on account of his 
veneration for usages and customs which have come 
down to him from dark and barbarous ages of super- 
stition and spiritual despotism, which the sainted John 
Robinson, in his celebrated farewell address to the pil- 
grims of Plymouth, most appropriately called the " depth 
of anti-Christian darkness " ? Can the usages which 
have come to us from those bad ages be worthy of our 
attachment and reverence, any further than they agree 



THE HOLY CATHOLTC CHURCH. 107 

with the institutions which the apostles planted ? If in 
any of these pages I have treated apostolic testimony 
with irreverence, or have misrepresented or misstated it, 
my readers may well be shocked and indignantly reject 
my conclusions. But if I have treated those records 
with reverence, and interpreted them with fairness and 
candor, let them reserve their indignation for those 
perversions and misrepresentations which have been 
foisted upon the sacred record by the superstition of 
later ages. I for one am determined, by the help of 
God, to learn what these records teach. 

There is then no difficulty in knowing what the Holy 
Catholic Church was, as it began to exist in the times 
of the apostles. Its catholicity was not organic and 
official, but, like everything else which came from Jesus 
Christ, moral and spiritual. By such ties only was it 
bound together in an all-pervading and perpetual unity 
of the Spirit. It was, as Archbishop Whately has 
described it, in words which cannot be improved, " one 

SCRIPTURAL BROTHERHOOD." It had ONE LORD, ONE 

faith, one baptism. The local churches which every- 
where existed were " united by the common principles 
on which they were founded, and by their mutual agree- 
ment, affection and respect." They were all earnest 
believers in the one crucified Christ that was risen from 
the dead. He was their prophet, priest and king. 
They accepted his teachings illustrated by his spirit 
and example, as the obligatory rule of life, and his 
death and resurrection as their hope of the life ever- 
lasting. They gladly observed baptism and the Lord's 
Supper as badges of their adherence to him in whatever 
times of persecution and suffering. They were every- 
where a peculiar people. Their peculiarity consisted in 
the fervor of their adherence to the crucified and risen 
Christ, and in the elevation and purity of their lives. 



103 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

Their common religious faith bound them to one another 
in all places, and united them into one world-wide 
brotherhood. In every community where they were 
found they were irresistibly drawn together by the 
strong attractions of their common faith and hope, into 
peculiar local societies, formed for the purpose of 
expressing their mutual affection, and becoming as far 
as possible helpful to each other's comfort and edifica- 
tion. In these societies they assembled themselves 
together once in every seven days for purposes of 
instruction and worship, and mutually participating in 
the breaking of bread in the name of the Lord. The 
organization of these local societies resulted necessarily 
from their common faith, affection and hope. They 
could not but be united in external and visible fellow- 
ship with all those living in the same community with 
themselves, who shared with them such beliefs and 
hopes. 

The whole body of believers everywhere was thor- 
oughly imbued with that spirit of all-embracing philan- 
throphy, which was so pre-eminently characteristic of 
the Founder. He came to be the Saviour of the world. 
As such his followers everywhere received him, and 
their hearts glowed with an intense enthusiasm to com- 
municate the blessings of this salvation to all the world. 
Hence the spirit of universal propagandism which has 
been the characteristic of Christianity in every age, and 
is not less intense in the nineteenth century than in any 
former age, unless perhaps I ought to except the age of 
the apostles. In that age the fervor of propagandism was 
entirely expended in publishing the story of the crucified 
Christ, his resurrection from the dead and repentance 
and forgiveness of sins in his name. The kingdom of 
heaven was not of this world. There was no hierarchy. 
The believers in different places and countries were 



THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH. 109 

bound together by no administrative bands, and no offi- 
cial functions, but only by faith in the Crucified One, and 
the common hope of the life eternal. This is the Holy 
Catholic Church of the apostolic age ; and it is incom- 
parably grander than all the pomp and splendor of the 
government of what is called the church, under popes 
and patriarchs and bishops and ecumenical councils. 
These forms and administrations of human device and 
manipulation may usurp the name of the Holy Catholic 
Church, but it is only a usurpation. The same that it 
was in the days of the apostles and as it came from the 
hand of its Founder, it ever has been, still is, and ever 
shall be, moral, spiritual, invisible, except as it is mani- 
fested by the rites of baptism and the Lord's Supper, 
the holy doctrine which it proclaims and the holy lives 
of its members. This is, I repeat it, and ever shall be, 
the Holy Catholic Church. It ever will be one of the 
noblest objects of a Christian's faith. 

An organic and official catholicity is a chimerical 
conception which never has been realized and never 
can be. Rome boasts her catholicity ; yet she excludes 
from her pale millions of the sincere adherents of the 
faith of Jesus Christ. To pretend that among all those 
whom she debars from her communion by her high pre- 
tensions of ghostly power, none are the accepted fol- 
lowers of Jesus Christ, is the very climax of arrogant 
absurdity. The same may be said of every other 
attempt at organic catholicity. It is catholicity which 
is no catholicity. By insisting on submission to author- 
ities which Jesus never established and to laws which 
he never enacted, it brands as rebels, it excludes from 
the pretended kingdom of heaven, multitudes who bear 
all the characteristics of true discipleship. It un- 
churches itself, and reveals itself as an anti-Christian 
combination falsely bearing the name of Christ. The 



IIO THE KEYS OF SECT. 

catholicity of faith and love is not only the primitive 
catholicity, but it is the only possible catholicity. All 
else is mere pretension and chimera. 

It is an exceedingly strong confirmation of the posi- 
tions maintained in this chapter, that the word " church " 
(ssuhpria) is used in strict conformity with them, when- 
ever religiously applied throughout the New Testament. 
It is employed in two senses only. In the language of 
the present it is used in a variety of senses often con- 
tradictory to each other, and contradictory to the use of 
it which prevails throughout the New Testament. This 
is just what we might expect. Confusion' of thought is 
always indicated by confusion of language. It is diffi- 
cult for us to conceive how harshly the jargon of modern 
Christendom would have sounded in apostolic ears. The 
Roman Catholic Church, the Greek Church, the Anglican 
Church, the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United 
States, and all the forms of speech which designate the 
wellnigh innumerable sects of modern Christendom, all 
claiming the honor and dignitv of the church of Christ, 
the kingdom of heaven, would have seemed to the dis- 
ciples of the first age barbarous and intolerable cor- 
ruptions of the classic speech of pure Christianity. In 
that age the word, in its religious use, always meant 
either the local society of believers united together for 
mutual fellowship and edification, or else the Holy 
Catholic Church as the author of the Epistle to the 
Hebrews describes it, " the city of the living God, the 
heavenly Jerusalem, the church of the first-born whose 
names are written in heaven." 1 Here is no confusion 
of tongues, because no confusion of thought. All is 
consistent and harmonious in the things that are de- 
scribed, and iii the language in which they are expressed. 

1 Hebrews xii : 22, 2^5. 



THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH. . Ill 

The time must come again, when the whole multitude 
of the disciples shall return to. the classic language 
of primitive Christianity. Then the world will know 
again what Christians mean, and Christians themselves 
will know what they mean, when they profess their 
faith in the Holy Catholic Church. 

This view of the church in apostolic times would iie 
very incomplete without an inquiry into the internal 
economy, or, as it is commonly called, the discipline of 
the independent societies which the apostles organized. 
It is only within very narrow limits, that these societies 
can be said to have been voluntary associations. They 
resulted indeed, not from direct command, but from the 
conscious wants . of devout persons of like faith and 
hopes. But the persons who united in organizing them 
were all subjects of the "kingdom of heaven," and were 
bound by all its laws. They had therefore no right to 
overlook or disregard one of Christ's "little ones." A 
selected portion of a Christian community could have 
no right to organize such a society on such principles as 
to separate themselves from the rest of their brethren, for 
the gratification of their own tastes and the indulgence 
of their own caprices, and to enter into arrangements 
for social worship and religious edification from which 
i a portion of their brethren were excluded. The king- 
dom of heaven recognizes no such aristocracy. Every 
local society of believers was therefore bound to embrace 
in its membership all the disciples of Christ within its 
territorial limits. As such societies were in their very 
nature expressions of mutual confidence, and the recog- 
nition of each other as disciples of Christ, the one 
motive which led to their organization would lead io 
the exclusion of those who denied Christ either in faith 
or life, just as it required the inclusion of all true disci- 
ples. They could exclude from membership only for 



112 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

cause, and the only cause which would justify exclusion 
was disloyalty to Christ. This was the only voluntary 
element in the reception of members. 

On the other hand, it was an obligation, obviously 
incumbent on every disciple of the Master, to associate 
himself with his brethren as intimately and permanently 
as possible, for the purposes of mutual edification and 
co-operation in the work of the Lord. Here also was a 
voluntary element. As the church might exclude one, 
whatever his professions, who obviously did not belong 
to the Master, so also an individual disciple might refuse 
to connect himself with a local society which he believed 
to be disloyal to Christ, whatever high professions it 
might make ; and might join with others who entertained 
the same views with himself, in organizing another soci- 
ety in the same community which would be true to 
Christian truth and duty. But nothing could justify 
him and his associates in taking such a step, but the 
fact that the existing so-called church had forsaken 
Christ. 

That the local churches of the apostles did claim the 
right and recognize the duty of excluding from member- 
ship persons who were unfaithful to Christ is clearly 
indicated in various places. This will be so generally 
admitted without hesitation that it is quite unnecessary 
to occupy space by particular quotations. The single 
example of the incestuous person whom Paul advises 
the Corinthian church " to deliver unto Satan " l will 
be quite sufficient. There is much disagreement among 
commentators about what the apostle meant by the 
words "deliver unto Satan," but there can be no doubt 
whatever that he meant to advise them to put away 
that wicked person from their number. The rightful- 

1 i Cor, v: 1-5. 



THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH. 113 

ness of this is so obvious that there is really no room 
for argument on the subject. Any society whatever, 
if it has a right to exist at all, has a right to exclude 
those who violate its fundamental law. Civil society 
exists for the protection of the person, the liberty and 
the property of every individual, and has no right to 
deny the benefit of such protection to any individual 
-human being that is loyal to its fundamental principles. 
But it has a right to exclude from its privileges any 
individual who lives in violation of those principles. 
In exactly the same manner the church in any commu- 
nity exists for the edification and spiritual care of the 
entire brotherhood of Christ, and can have no right to 
overlook the humblest and feeblest individual ; but it 
has a right to cast out and disown any one who in his 
life tramples on the fundamental principles of its organi- 
zation, and discards that faith in Jesus Christ which is 
the only bond which binds its members together. 

How then was the government of these Christian 
societies related to the rites of baptism and the Lord's 
Supper ? Did this unquestioned right to exclude from 
their membership persons who are obviously disloyal 
to Christ, imply that these local churches were the 
divinely constituted guardians of these Christian rites? 
One would think that to ask the question were to 
answer it. But many think otherwise, and the question 
must therefore be examined. It has already been 
shown, that in apostolic times those rites were not 
placed under the guardianship of any clergy or priestly 
corporation. It is another question that now claims 
our consideration. Were the organized local churches 
the divinely appointed guardians of these rites ? When 
for example one wished to be baptized in profession 
of his faith in Christ, must he make his application to 
some local church to be admitted to that privilege ? 
8 



114 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

Might he not say to the Christian teacher cr friend by 
whom he had been led to Christ, as the eunuch said to 
Philip, " What cloth hinder me to be baptized ? " Does 
his baptism signify his admission into some local church ? 
Or is it the external sign of his new birth into the one 
family of Christ? It would surely seem that, in view 
of the precedents of the New Testament, to ask these 
questions is to answer them. It cannot be claimed for 
a moment, that it was necessary to apply to a local 
church to gain admission to the right of baptism, or 
that the receiving of it placed one in any peculiar rela- 
tions with any local church. Baptism belonged, not to 
the local church, but to the church universal. 

How then stands the case in respect to the Lord's 
Supper? I can have no doubt, that in this respect 
also the relation of the local church to the church 
universal is perfectly analogous to that of the syna- 
gogue to the Mosaic economy. As the synagogue had 
no control over any of the rites of Judaism, so the 
local church, the Christian synagogue, had none over 
either of the rights of Christianity. Whoever will con- 
sult the history of those times l will see, that the "break- 
ing of bread " was practised not only when the whole 
church came together, but from "house to hcuse," that 
is, wherever the Christians were met for worship. It is 
also obvious from the same narrative, that the " break- 
ing of bread " took place before there was any organ- 
ized local church, not only in the upper chamber where 
it was instituted, but among the multitudinous converts 
at Jerusalem. The multitude of them that believed 
not only sealed their acceptance of Jesus by receiving 
baptism, but by uniting in observing that rite which 
commemorated his death for their sins, before there 

] Acts ii : 41-47. 



THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH. 115 

could have been any local church to take part in the 
matter. There is nothing to create the belief, that after 
local churches were organized, they took the guardianship 
of this rite. It continued to be the custom, that wher- 
ever a company of Christians were met together, the 
" breaking of bread and prayers " were parts of their 
worship, and the church in its corporate capacity exer- 
cised no more guardianship over the one than over the 
other. 

But, it is perhaps asked, when the Corinthian church 
"put away that wicked person from among them," did 
they not by that act express their conviction that he 
was an unfit person to join with them in celebrating 
this rite ? Doubtless, and that he was equally unfit to 
join with them in their prayers or in any other act of 
worship. It no more implied a guardianship over one 
than over another. Let us suppose that their prayers 
were responsive, and that after his exclusion from 
membership, this person had continued to come into 
their assembly as before, and had continued to join, 
perhaps even ostentatiously, in the responses, would 
they not have been as truly shocked by his conduct as 
though he had joined with them in the breaking of 
bread ? His exclusion from the society no more im- 
plied that he was cut off from one of these modes of 
worship than from the other. If he had any sense of 
propriety, he would not join with them in either of these 
acts of worship, till he had confessed and forsaken his 
sin. But it would not be because the church exercised 
any guardianship or control over either of them, but 
only because he must know that the members of the 
church would be shocked and pained at his impudent 
hypocrisy. Chevalier Bunsen says in a remarkable 
passage, which will be quoted a little further on, that 
the worship of the early Christians was secret. If this 



Il6 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

were true, exclusion from the society would imply exclu- 
sion from all their worship. It can be easily shown 
that in the ages which followed that of the apostles this 
was true, but it is one of the points in which the churches 
of the next centuries certainly did very widely deviate 
from apostolic usage. This will be made to appear in 
a subsequent chapter. But it is certainly an error to 
represent the worship of the Christians in apostolic 
times as secret. In writing to the Corinthians, Pas.l 
says, " If therefore the whole church be come together 
into one place, and all speak with tongues, and there 
come in those that are unlearned, or unbelievers, will 
they not say that ye are mad ? But if all prophesy, 
and there come in one that believeth not, or one un- 
learned, he is convinced of all, he is judged of all : 
and thus are the secrets of his heart made manifest ; 
and so, falling down on his face he will worship God, 
and report that God is in you of a truth." l This ren- 
ders it certain that according to Paul's understanding 
of the matter, the worship of the Christians was open 
to unbelievers and persons unacquainted with the 
gospel. 

As the case stands, there is no evidence at all that 
the primitive churches exercised any corporate guardian- 
ship whatever over the Lord's Supper, to debar unworthy 
persons from participating in it, more than from joining 
in their prayers. When Paul is reproving the Corinthian 
church for great irregularities in observing it, he speaks 
not a word of exhortation to caution in the admission 
of persons to participation in it. The impression is 
made throughout, that in respect to this as to every 
other part of worship, the individual was held responsi- 
ble for his own honesty and sincerity ; and there is no 

1 I Cox. xiv: 23-25. 



THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH. 117 

intimation that any qualification for the observance of 
this rite was regarded as requisite, other than an honest 
wish to honor Christ. We can find no traces of any 
ecclesiastical barriers erected around it, to protect its 
sanctity from profanation. No stronger barrier can be 
devised than to erect over it the banner of the crucified 
Christ, and, with the authority of truth and sincerity, to 
insist that to come to that table otherwise than to honor 
him is a sin against God. 

On the supposition that the apostles did regard the 
local churches in their organic capacity as charged with 
the duty of keeping guard over the Lord's Supper, to 
protect it from profanation by the exercise of its author- 
ity, it is utterly incredible that the subject should have 
been left as it is, — no allusion to any such guardianship 
in the accounts which the evangelists have given of the 
institution of the rite ; no exhortation in any of the let- 
ters of the apostles to particular churches to fidelity in 
the discharge of such a trust; even when an apostle is 
sharply rebuking a particular church for great impro- 
prieties in observing the rite, no allusion whatever to 
any such responsibility of the church for the fitness of 
those who are permitted to participate in it ; no single 
example of any case in which a church exercised such a 
guardianship ; no trace of its recognized existence in all 
the history of the times. Stronger historic evidence is 
scarcely possible, that such a guardianship was not insti- 
tuted by Christ or enjoined by the apostles. Absolutely 
nothing meets our view in all the literature of the time 
to indicate that such an institution was ever thought 
of. It does not belong to that age. It is an invention 
of later times thrown back upon the apostolic age, and 
interpreted into the New Testament, not learned by 
fair interpretation from it. 

I am well aware that this conclusion will be verv ear- 



Il8 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

nestly rejected by many persons whom I regard with 
sincere and reverential affection. Some of them will 
not only reject it, but they will be shocked at it, as 
though it were something impious. But in the name of 
God I stand by the evidence. The time has fully come 
when it is a solemn necessity of all Christian people to 
understand the church of the New Testament. I have 
sought to put the case precisely as it stands in those 
only trustworthy primitive records of our faith. No 
man can deal fairly with those records and present it 
otherwise. Before I am through with the work I have 
in hand, it will be my duty to show that by interpreting 
into the language of the New Testament customs and 
ideas which the apostles never thought of, and which 
have no claim on the reverence of a Christian people, 
the church of God has been fearfully corrupted, and is 
to-day in every part of Christendom filled with confu- 
sion, weakness and anarchy. 

I close this chapter by quoting in confirmation of 
most of the views I have taken of the constitution and 
condition of the apostolic churches, the clearly expressed 
opinion of a scholar of the highest eminence in this 
department of literature and criticism. It is as fol- 
lows : — 

" As to the Christian congregations of this period, 
their members were in the first instance mostly of the 
lower classes, workingmen, slaves or freedmen. Soon, 
however, Christianity gained proselytes among the rich 
and higher classes, at least out of Palestine, particularly 
among the women. Each congregation was called origi- 
nally by the same name as their place of worship, a 
synagogue, of which ' congregation ' is the Latin trans- 
lation. Afterwards the Hellenistic expression ' popular 
meeting,' ' ecclesia,' became prevalent ; the last appel- 
lation, taken from the name of the place of worship 



THE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH. Iig 

(kyriake, the house of the Lord), has caused this word 
to be translated church, kirk, kirche. The Hebrew and 
Hellenic names have in common the idea of a congrega- 
tion of people. 

Each church was independent of the others ; they 
were governed by leaders, called by the translated 
Hebrew name presbyters, that is to say elders, or by 
the Hellenic name bishops, cpiscopi, that is, superin- 
tendents or overseers, inspectors. The apostles acted 
as the general visitors or advisers of these congrega- 
tions ; but they did not interfere with their legislative 
automony any more than did the elders or bishops. In 
all cases the ecclesia was autonomic, sovereign ; the 
apostles themselves took their place in these assem- 
blies. That autonomy did not produce separation, 
because the Christian congregations had the spirit of 
Christ in them. The practice at Jerusalem of a com- 
munity of goods was, naturally, soon abandoned, 
because it would have led, if further developed, to mis- 
chievous results. " Pray and work " was the watch- 
word. But the principle of brotherhood remained ■ the 
whole fabric of the growing community was based upon 
mutual brotherly aid and assistance, proceeding from a 
spirit of thankful love to God. Thus, serving charity, 
the diaconia became the substitute for police and mili- 
tary command, and foreshadowed the immense unparal- 
leled change which the social state of the world was 
destined to undergo. 

" In this manner, under such leaders, and with such an 
organization, a chain was formed almost imperceptibly, 
through all the provinces of the Roman Empire, of 
secretly (?) worshipping, self-supporting, independent, 
but sincerely attached societies. . . . 

"The first link of that chain was in Jerusalem, from 
whence it extended itself to Antioch and Babylonia, 



120 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

and from Syria to every part of Asia Minor, as well as 
Egypt* an d having reached Europe, by way of Macedo- 
nia, Achaia, and the isles of the Mgean Sea, it embraced 
the metropolis of the ancient world a few 3^ears before 
the two princes of the apostles perished there in the 
Neronian persecutions of the year 65 of our era." l 

1 Bunsen's Hippolytus and his Age, Vol. I. p. 29. Reasons have 
already been assigned for rejecting the statement that the worship 
of the primitive church was secret. 



PA-RT II. 



THE TRANSITION CHURCH, 



CHAPTER I. 

THE RISE OF HIERARCHY. 

Thus far the attention of the reader has been con- 
stanily directed to the single inquiry, "What was the 
conception according to which Jesus organized his 
kingdom in the world ? " In the effort to answer this 
question, information has been exclusively sought from 
the sayings, the deeds, and in short from the whole 
history of the manifested Messiah, and from the consti- 
tution which his chosen apostles gave to the churches 
which they organized, as decisively indicating their 



understanding of the intentions of their Master. There 
is in the extant apostolic records no lack of material 
out of which to reconstruct the churches of the apostles, 
and from which to learn with a high degree of certainty 
the organic conception of the Founder. The apostolic 
age is a stage in the history of Christianity which, so 
far as principles are concerned, is independent and 
complete in itself, and needs not to be corrected or sup- 
plemented by the records of any subsequent ages. Any 
attempt thus to correct or supplement it is obviously 
improper and impertinent. The church exists only by 



122 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

the authority of Jesus Christ. It can have no constitu- 
tion but that which he gave it. It can have no laws 
but those which he enacted, unless it can be shown 
that those laws emanate from some legislative authority 
which he constituted. Of the. origin and constitution 
of the church the apostles are our only witnesses, and 
their testimony is only transmitted to us in the records 
which they have left us. If the constitution of the 
church in any subsequent age differs from that of the 
apostolic age, it only shows us that the men who came 
after the apostles deviated from the divine pattern, and 
have left us an example which it is improper and unsafe 
for us to follow. 

This examination of the constitution of the apostolic 
churches was not undertaken, as the reader is already 
aware, for the gratification of mere curiosity ; but for 
the purpose of bringing before our minds the original 
conception of the church, in order that we may com- 
pare with it the church as it has existed in subsequent 
ages, and especially as it exists in our own. No man 
can make such a comparison with fairness and candor 
'without being impressed by the greatness of the con- 
trast which exists between the church of the present 
and the primitive model. There is no room for any 
doubt that the church of modern times, under all its 
variety of constitutions and usages, derives its origin 
from that of the apostolic age. It cannot therefore be 
uninteresting or unimportant to inquire through what 
steps of change, running through a period of eighteen 
centuries, the church of the apostles has passed into 
the church of modern Christendom. Of course it is not 
to be expected, that in a work of this size any full 
account can be given in detail of the progress of those 
changes which have occurred, and of the causes by 
which they have been produced. But it seems impor- 



THE RISE OF HIERARCHY. 1 23 

tant to the purpose in hand to mark four distinct stages 
through which the church has passed, in its progress 
from its primitive condition to the complicated and 
anarchic religious phenomena of -the nineteenth cen- 
tury. These four stages are represented to the mind 
by the church of the second and third centuries or the 
ante-Nicene church, the church of the Middle Ages, 
the Reformation and Protestantism. Each of these 
stages must be examined in order that we may discern 
the relation of each to that which preceded and that 
which followed it. The examination of the first three 
stages must be confined to a general outline, that of the 
fourth more detailed and exhaustive. The present 
chapter will be devoted to the ante-Nicene church. 

One canot enter on such an examination without a 
feeling of reverence not unmingled even with awe. It 
was the age of heroic martyrdom. We must not, we 
cannot forget that it is to the martyr spirit of that age 
we are indebted for the fact, that the church of Christ 
has any existence in the nineteenth century. There is 
reason however to suspect, that that very reverence 
has sometimes proved injurious to the cause of truth. 
The suffering which the men of that age endured has 
seemed to screen them from that criticism to which 
other ages are always subject. It seems ungrateful to 
those heroic martyrs to sit in our studies in this age of 
unbounded religious liberty, a religious liberty which 
we enjoy as the fruit of their heroic endurance of mar- 
tyrdom, to call in question their views of Christian 
doctrine, or their practices in the constitution and gov- 
ernment of the church. For this very reason it is and 
long has been difficult, if not impossible, to assign to 
the church of that age its proper position in history, 
and to award to it only its proper influence on the 
thinking and action of subsequent ages. Reverence 



124 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

for those heroic men is right, and the absence of it dis- 
graceful. But martyrs however heroic are not therefore 
inspired teachers and examples to all subsequent ages. 
We are to judge of those men and their works only as 
we judge of all other men, by comparing them with the 
word of the Lord. That they were heroic does not 
prove that they were infallible. We may reverence the 
moral greatness of the men, while we fearlessly compare 
their teachings and their practices with the divine 
standard, and approve or condemn accordingly. We 
are under no necessity of adopting their teachings when 
they contradict the teachings of Jesus, or of following 
their examples when they are plainly at variance with 
the example of the apostles. 

One cannot become much acquainted with the moral 
scenery of that age without perceiving, that it is very 
broadly contrasted with that of apostolic times. To 
deny that it is so is a palpable manifestation either of 
ignorance or want of truthfulness. An hour spent in 
reading Tertullian and Cyprian does not seem much 
like an hour spent with Luke and Paul, or Peter and 
John. We feel that we are communing with men of 
another spirit, and living and moving and having our 
being in very different systems of thought. We cannot 
make ourselves believe that the order of things which 
meets our view in earl)'- patristic literature is either 
identical with that which we find in the apostolic rec- 
ords, or the legitimate product of it. We feel that 
elements utterly incongruous with primitive Christianity 
have found their way into the church, and greatly modi- 
fied both its constitution and its teachings. If the 
Christian literature of those centuries were generally 
accessible to the English reader, I should not think it 
necessary to fortify these assertions by any citation of 
particular passages. But as such is not the fact, I must 



the r:se of hierarchy. 125 

make good my position by giving specimens from the 
writings of these men. I purpose therefore to prove 
by quotations from the Christian literature of the second 
and third centuries the following four propositions : — 

t. That the church in those centuries was infected 
by a ritualistic spirit, which is quite foreign to the times 
of the apostles. 

2. That the church in those centuries invested its 
officers with authority and power for which we find no 
warrant in the apostolic records, even making the offi- 
cers of the church a priesthood, and claiming for them 
the authority which belonged to the priests and Levites 
of the old dispensation. 

3. That the rites of baptism and the Lord's Sapper 
were placed under the exclusive control of this priest- 
hood, and thereby greatly perverted from their original 
aim. 

4. That the church of those centuries was deeply 
corrupted by the doctrine of celibacy, and interfered 
with the relations of the sexes otherwise than in the 
interest of moral purity, and greatly to the injury of 
domestic morality. 

The ritualism of the ante-Nicene church first claims 
our attention. To avoid the danger of using language 
indefinitely, it is necessary to define ritualism. By rit- 
ualism I mean a worship in which undue importance is 
attached to external and material conditions, to circum- 
stances of time and place and form, to positions of the 
body and ceremonial observances. No one acquainted 
with the Christian literature of the age referred to needs 
to be told, that in this respect there is a very broad con- 
trast between it and the books of the New Testament. 
One may be himself a ritualist, and may regard the 
writings of those early fathers as a great improvement 
upon those of the apostles, and may persuade himself 



126 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

th^t the worship of the primitive church was more ritual 
than it appears to be , but he surely cannot deny that 
such a contrast really exists. But for the benefit of 
those who have no access to the writings of those early 
fathers it is necessary to give a few examples. 

One of the topics upon which these writers have 
spoken most copiously is baptism. From Tertullian we 
have a treatise on this subject of some length. In that 
treatise we find the doctrine of baptismal regeneration 
steadily and consistently maintained. It is by baptism 
that our former sins are washed away, and we are pre- 
pared to receive the Holy Ghost. Without any reserva- 
tion he speaks of the water " By which we are washed 
from the sins of our former blindness, and set free for 
eternal life." 1 He has labored through two chapters 2 
to show the natural fitness of water to be the instru- 
ment cf this purification. He refers in this connection 
to the spirit of God " moving upon the face of the 
waters," as emblematical of the use of water in baptism, 
and of the gift of the Holy Ghost as a consequence of 
it. He says the act of baptism by which we are im- 
mersed in the water is corporeal ; the effect is spiritual, 
we are released from our sins. : * In the next chapter, 
and abundantly throughout the treatise, the reception 
of the Holy Ghost is said to be in consequence of bap- 
tism. "Then that most Holy Spirit willingly descends 
from the Father upon those bodies purified (by baptism) 
and blessed (by the laying on of hands)." 4 To give a 
correct idea of the ritualism, the downright materialism 
of this writer, it would be necessary to quote the whole 
treatise, and then there would be no need of spending 
any more words to prove the greatness of the revolution 



1 De Baptismo, Cap. i. 3 De Baptismo, Cap. 7. 

2 Cap. 3 and 4, Paris edition. 4 De Baptismo, Cap 8. 



THE RISE OF HIERARCHY. 1 27 

in the direction of ritualism, which took place between 
the apostles on the one hand and Tertullian on the 
other. 

This revolution did not respect baptism alone, but 
existed in many other details of worship and life. To 
prove this I quote the following passage of greater 
length, describing customs which prevailed in his time, 
and for which he claims full authority, though he admits 
that they are sanctioned only by custom and tradition, 
not being required by any law laid down in Scrip- 
ture : — 

" To begin with baptism, when about to enter the 
water, in that same place, and also a little before in the 
church, under the hand of the president, we profess 
that we renounce the devil, his pomp, and his angels : 
then we are immersed thrice, pledging somewhat more 
at large than the Lord appointed in the gospel. Then 
being taken up " (taken up after the new birth of bap- 
tism as a new-born infant is taken up) "we first taste a 
mixture of milk and honey : and from that day we 
abstain from the daily bath for a whole week. We 
take, not from the hands of any other than the presi- 
dents, the sacrament of the eucharist commanded by 
the Lord (to be taken) at meal times, and by all, and 
also in meetings before daybreak. We make offerings 
for the dead, and for the martyrs on their anniversary 
day. We think it wrong to fast, or to worship on our 
knees on the Lord's day. We glory in the same immu- 
nity from the day of the Passover to the Pentecost. It 
would be painful to us that any portion of the wine or 
fie bread, even though our own, should be dropped 
on the ground. At every advance and movement, at 
every coming in and going out, on putting on our 
shoes, at the bath, at the table, on lighting the 
lamps, at our seats, at our bed-s, whatever con versa- 



128 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

tion occupies us, we mark our foreheads with the sign 
of the cross." 1 

It surely needs no argument to prove that this is not 
the moral scenery of apostolic times. The- thought can 
hardly fail to suggest itself even here, that it is the 
moral scenery of after ages of superstition and spiritual 
despotism. Tertullian lived between the years 160 
A. D. and 240 A. D. From Cyprian, bishop of Car- 
thage, who suffered martyrdom in the year 258, I make 
the following extracts: "It is manifest where and by 
whom that remission of sins can be given which is given 
in baptism." 2 He argues that it is given in and by the 
church and not by heretics. Throughout the whole 
treatise from which this quotation is made, the writer 
steadily and consistently argues, that the church has 
and heretics have not the power of purifying men from 
sin by administering to them the rite of baptism. The 
church in Cyprian's time was greatly agitated by the 
question, whether persons coming to the church after 
having been baptized by heretics ought to be rebap- 
tized. He very strenuously maintained the affirmative, 
and it is chiefly in arguing on this question, that his 
view of baptism itself is expressed. From one of these 
arguments I quote the following : " For since there 
cannot be two baptisms, if the heretics truly baptize 
they have the (one true) baptism. And he who presents 
to them from his authority this countenance yields to 
them and consents that an enemy and adversary of 
Christ may seem to have the power of washing and 
purifying and sanctifying a man." 3 It is plain that the 
power here spoken of is the power of baptism. In the 
same letter he says "that they who are not in the 

1 De Corona, Cap. 3, Paris edition. 

2 De Hereticis Baptizandis, Cap. 7, Paris edition. 

3 Epis. 71, Paris edition. 



THE RISE OF HIERARCHY. 129 

chureb of Christ are reckoned among the dead, nor can 
another be brought to life by him who is not himself 
alive, since there is one church which has obtained the 
grace of eternal life, and lives eternally and gives life 
to the people of God." According to the view of 
Cyprian a man must be brought to life, that is born 
again, by baptism, and it is by baptism that the church 
gives life to the people of God. As natural life dates 
from birth, so the new life dates from the new birth or 
baptism. This mode of argument is repeated by Cyprian 
times almost without number. 

I give the following quotation from the church and 
house book of the ancient Christians, on the authority 
of Chevalier Eunsen, as of uncertain origin indeed, but 
undoubtedly belonging to the age about which we are 
inquiring. It has reference to the administration of 
baptism to catechumens who have accomplished the 
required course of preparatory training, which gener- 
ally occupied three years, at least in tlje church at 
Alexandria. 

IX. How the water is to be prepared and the general 
order of baptism. , 

And at the time of the crowing of the cock, let them 
first pray over the water. Let the water be drawn into 
the font or flow into it. And let it be thus, if they 
have no scarcity. But if there be a scarcity, let them 
pour the water which shall be found into the font ; and 
let them undress themselves, and the young shall be 
first baptized. And after the adult men have been 
baptized, at last the women, having loosed all their 
hair, and having laid aside their ornaments of gold and 
silver which were on them. Let not any one take a 
strange garment with him into the water. (Copt. Can. 
b. II. 46.) 

X. How the oiifor the anointing is prepared. 

9 



130 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

And at the time which is appointed for the baptism 
let the bishop give thanks over the oil, which, putting 
into a. vessel, he shall call the oil of thanksgiving. 
Again, he shall take the other oil, and exorcising over 
it, he shall call it the " oil of exorcism." And a deacon 
shall bear the oil of exorcism, and stand on the left 
hand of the presbyter. Another deacon shall take the 
oil of thanksgiving, and stand on the right hand of the 
presbyter. (Copt. Can. b. II. 46.) 

XI. Hoiv they are to renounce Satan and be anoinled: 
and then say the creed. 

And when the presbyter has taken hold of each one 
of those who are about to receive baptism, let him 
command him to renounce, saying: "I will renounce 
thee, Satan, and all thy service, and all thy works," and 
when he has renounced all these, let him anoint him 
with the oil of exorcism, saying : " Let every spirit 
depart from me." And let the bishop or the presbyter 
receive him thus undressed, to place him in the water 
of baptism. Also let the deacon go with him into the 
water and let him say to him, helping him that he 
may say : " I believe in the only true God, the Father 
Almighty, and in his only begotten son Jesus Christ, 
our Lord and Saviour, and in the Holy Spirit, the 
quickener." 

And let him who receiveth baptism repeat after all 
these: "I believe thus." And he who bestoweth it 
shall lay his hand upon the head of him who receiveth, 
dipping him three times, confessing these things each 
time. And afterwards let him say again : " Dost thou 
believe in our Lord Jesus Christ, the only son of Gocl, 
the Father ; that he became man in a wonderful manner 
for us, in an incomprehensible unity, by his Holy 
Spirit, of Mary the Holy Virgin, without the seed of 
man, and that he was crucified for us under Pontius 



THE RISE OF HIERARCHY. 131 

Pilate, and died of his own will for our redemption, and 
rose on the third day, loosing the bands of death ; that 
he ascended up into heaven, and sate on the right hand 
of his good Father on high, and that he cometh again 
to judge the living and the dead at the appearing of 
him and his kingdom ? And dost thou believe in the 
Holy good Spirit, and quickener, who wholly purifieth 
in the Holy Church ? " Let him again say : " I believe." l 
(Copt. Can. b. II. 46.) 

In another section we find very detailed directions 
for giving the eucharist to those who have been newly 
baptized, followed with a mixture of milk and honey, 
which they are to receive as an emblem of the promise, 
" I will give you a land flowing with milk and honey." 2 

It is not necessary perhaps to make any further 
quotations in proof of the ritualism of the ante-Nicene 
church. It is not agreeable to make such quotations, 
and they will not be pleasant reading to many for whose 
eyes they are intended. It is sufficient if I have quoted 
enough to present the strange contrast which meets us 
on passing from the apostolic records, to the extant 
writings of the leading men of the ages that immediately 
followed. It certainly is important to a correct under- 
standing of the subject we are considering, that the 
greatness of this contrast should be fully appreciated. 
In the apostolic records everywhere the spirit is every- 
thing, the external form and manner nothing. In these 
writings the most minute circumstances of external 
form are magnified into matters of importance. For 
example, in Matthew's account of the baptism of Jesus, 
we are unable to ascertain by what act the baptism was 



1 Hip. and his Age, Vol. II. pp. 16-18. 

2 Hip. and his Age, Vol. II. p. 19. See also Hip. and his Age, 
Vol. II. pp. 64-66. 



IJ2 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

performed. " And Jesus, when he was baptized went 
up straightway out of the water"; but whether Jesus 
was plunged into the water, or the water was poured 
upon him, the narrative does not inform us. If anyone 
says that that information was conveyed by the word 
"baptize," I answer, I cannot so understand it. John 
the Baptist said to his hearers, " I indeed baptize you 
with water unto repentance ; but he that cometh after 
me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to 
bear, he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and 
with fire." This undoubtedly refers to the gift of the 
Holy Ghost with the appearance of tongues of flame 
on the day of Pentecost. This certainly was not a dip- 
ping into, but a pouring upon. Who shall tell us then 
which of these actions it was which John performed 
upon Jesus in the water of Jordan? We are informed 
that the water was applied as an emblem of moral purity. 
But in the rubrics for the administration of baptism in 
these documents of the early church, how minute and 
often how puerile are the details which are insisted on ! 
The number of times the acts shall be performed, the 
dressing and the undressing, the exorcism, the anointing 
from head to foot with oil, the removal of any ornaments 
which women might wear, and many other minutice which 
it is not necessary to particularize. Here is a tendency 
to materialize and externalize worship, which is utterly 
foreign to the spirit of the New Testament. 

There is no foundation whatever for assuming, that 
these things are a natural development of anything in 
the teaching or lives of Jesus or his apostles. They^ 
evidently came in upon the church from the spirit of 
the age, from that very condition of society and opinion 
which essentially disqualified the men of that age to 
appreciate either Jesus or his doctrine. They are the 
products of that " mystery of iniquity " which Paul saw 



THE RISE OF HIERARCHY. 133 

already working. Nor is there any difficulty at all in 
discerning the causes of this mischief. The whole ten- 
dency of the Jewish people was to substitute the cere- 
monial for the moral and spiritual, the sign for the thing 
signified. The prophets often rebuked this tendeney 
with great severity, and with that fervid eloquence in 
which they were pre-eminent over most other men. 1 
Whenever Judaism was corrupted it was always in this 
direction. In the age of which we are writing it was 
fatally corrupted. It tithed mint, anise and cummin, 
and omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgment, 
mercy and faith. For a pretence it made long prayers, 
while it devoured widows' houses. 2 It carefully cleansed 
the outside, while moral pollution defiled all within. 
Vast numbers of converts to Christianity were drawn in 
every country from this corrupted Judaism. From this 
source it could not but be, that there should be a large 
incoming of tendencies to materialize and ritualize the 
worship of the Christian communities. 

Still more powerfully did the immemorial usages and 
ideas of the prevailing paganism tend to corrupt the 
church in the same direction. No one at all acquainted 
with the paganism of that age can need to be informed, 
that its worship was almost purely ceremonial, with 
scarcely a moral element. Ritualism and materialism 
were inwrought into its very essence. A Gentile con- 
vert could scarcely conceive it possible, that a religious 
rite such as baptism or the Lord's Supper could be 
observed with the grand simplicity which is everywhere 
found in the New Testament. The mode of observance 
must be prescribed by a rubric which sh'ould enter into 
its minutest details. Such was the fact with all the 
religious ceremonies to which they had been accustomed 

1 Isaiah, chap, i; also chap. lviii. 2 Matt. chap, xxiii. 



134 THE KEYS O? SECT. 

in their pagan worship ; and the human mind, unless 
deeply imbued with the exalted moral conceptions of 
Christianity, always attaches sacredness to the forms 
under which acts of worship are performed. It is im- 
possible to conceive that there should not have been a 
very powerful tendency to reduce the rites of baptism 
and the Lord's Supper to a prescribed rubric, and to 
add from time to time new ceremonials, adapted to the 
taste and conformed to the immemorial usages of a 
pagan population. If, for example, a great movement 
were to occur in favor of Christianity in the empire of 
China, and many millions of its people should within 
two or three generations be gathered into Christian 
churches, and these churches Avere left for subsequent 
ages with no influence from the rest of the Christian 
world, to develop according to their own tendencies, and 
grow from their own roots, the immemorial ideas and 
usages of pagan China would exert an exceedingly 
important and disastrous influence on the development. 
These tendencies would manifest themselves under the 
eyes of the original missionaries ; and as soon as the 
last of them was gone, would in all probability rapidly 
corrupt the whole structure of Christian society. 

This is precisely what did take place in the first ages 
of Christianity. Under such influences the rapid cor- 
ruption of Christianity was inevitable. To have pre- 
vented the growth of ritualism in the early church 
would have required a constant exertion of miraculous 
powers no less conspicuously than they were employed 
in originating Christianity, and in qualifying the apostles 
for their divine mission. If any one is disposed to ask 
why that miraculous power did not continue to be 
exerted, I answer that one might just as well ask why 
a miraculous revelation of religion is not made to all 
men in all countries and ages, and thus the growth of 



THE RISE OF HIERARCHY. 135 

superstition in the world rendered impossible. These 
are questions which the human intellect cannot com- 
pass. It is wisdom for us to receive things as they are, 
rather than to dictate to the Supreme Ruler of the 
universe how they should be. It is certain that if 
Christianity was given to the world by a miraculous 
revelation, and left to be developed without further 
miraculous interposition, it must have been corrupted 
as it was, and ritualism must have been one of the 
forms of corruption. It is the glory of Christianity, 
not that it was attended by a perpetual exertion of 
supernatural power to render its corruption impossible, 
but that its moral forces gained such a hold on human 
society, that that corruption could not be perpetual ; 
that its reformatory power would sooner or later make 
itself felt, and secure the realization of the moral con- 
ception of its founder. This is our hope in dealing 
with any corruptions of Christianity which still exist. 
There is a reforming power in the Christ of the New 
Testament, which, in the course of the ages, will surely 
prove itself irresistible. 

The attention of the reader is next invited to the 
proposition, that the church in those centuries invested 
its officers with authority and power for which we find 
no warrant in the apostolic writings, even making" the 
officers of the church a priesthood, and claiming for 
them the authority which belonged to the priests and 
Levites of the old dispensation. 

It is, I think, evident that the progress of this change 
was gradual though rapid. Clement of Rome seems to 
have been in part contemporary with the apostles and 
personally acquainted with Paul. He is the reputed 
author of two epistles to the church of the Corinthians 
which are extant. The genuineness of at least the first 
of these is generally conceded. In this epistle he uses 



136 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

language, certainly in some instances, in such a manner 
as to show that the words "presbyter" and "bishop" 
were still used interchangeably after the manner of tne 
apostles. 1 In the same connection however he insists 
on the authority and honor due to church officers, and 
emphasizes the fact that they were constituted by the 
apostles, in such a way as to indicate, that a change was 
already in progress in the relation of church officers to 
their charges. The youth of Ignatius joins upon the 
old age of the apostle John. He suffered martyrdom 
by being thrown to the wild beasts in the amphitheatre 
at Rome by the command of Trajan. Seven epistles 
of his remain, believed to be genuine, though not with- 
out suspicion of interpolation. In one of these written 
to the Trallians, 2 he clearly marks the distinction of 
three orders in the ministry. In his epistle to Polycarp 3 
the same distinction is insisted on, with earnest exhorta- 
tion to honor and obey church officers according to the 
rank and dignity of each. The churches however still 
continued to be independent local societies, and the 
bishop was only the presiding officer of a particular 
church with its presbytery and deacons. The distinc- 
tion of three grades in the ministry seems to have origi- 
nated in Asia Minor and not at Rome. It was such a 
gradation of official rank as might be adopted in a 
Congregational church without essentially modifying 
its constitution. It must be admitted however that 
if the epistles of Ignatius are genuine, he claimed a 
dignity and authority for the office of bishop, which 
foreshadowed the great changes which were soon 
to follow. The following specimen should not be 
omitted: "Let the laity be in subjection to the dea- 
cons, the deacons to the presbyters, the presbyters to 

1 Cap. XLIV., Paris edition. 2 Cap. II. and III. 3 Cap. VI. 



THE RISE OF HIERARCHY. 1 37 

the bishop, the bishop to Christ, even as Christ is to 
the Father." 1 

The following is from Clement of Alexandria : " Since 
according to my opinion, the grades here in the church 
of bishops, presbyters, deacons, are imitations of the 
angelic glory and of that economy which, the Scriptures 
say, awaits those who, following in the footsteps of 
the apostles, have lived in perfection of righteousness 
according to the gospel." 2 

When we come to such writers as Tertullian and 
Cyprian, it is useless to occupy space with particular 
quotations. Their recognition of a clerical hierarchy in 
three orders is as distinct and abundant as can be found 
in the writers of subsequent ages. It gives color to 
everything they ever wrote. They constantly speak of 
the clergy as a priesthood, divinely appointed and 
constituted, as the priesthood of the old dispensation 
was. They speak of the Lord's Supper as a sacrifice. 
Councils of bishops or bishops and presbyters, were 
often assembled, and enacted regulations for the gov- 
ernment of the churches in whole provinces. The gov- 
ernment of the church became much more centralized 
in subsequent ages, but loftier claims were scarcely ever 
made in behalf of the authority of the clergy. It is 
only necessary to say, that if any one wishes further 
evidence of the truth of these assertions, he can cer- 
tainly obtain it, if he possesses a competent knowledge 
of Latin, by spending a few hours in reading Cyprian's 
letters, or Tertullian's " Treatise on Baptism." He will 
even find the ecclesiastical interpretation of the primacy 
of Peter fully recognized and accepted. 

The following, which I give on the authority of Chev- 
elier Bunsen, is in perfect harmony with the preceding : 

1 Ep. ad Smyrnaeos, Cap. IX. 2 Stromata Liber, VI. Cap. 13. 



I38 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

"General Definitions of the Peculiar Right and Power of 
the Different Members of the Clergy. 

" The bishop blesseth, but is not blessed. He ordain- 
eth, layeth on hands upon men, putteth on the oblation, 
receiveth the blessing from the bishop, but not from 
the presbyters. The bishop anathematizeth (excludeth) 
every clergyman who deserveth to be anathematized 
(excluded) ; but to another bishop he is without the 
power to do this alone. 

,S A presbyter also blesseth and receiveth the blessing 
from his fellow-presbyter and from the bishop ; and he 
likewise giveth it to his fellow-presbyter. He layeth 
his hands on men, but he doth not ordain, neither doth 
he anathematize. He putteth out those who are under 
him ; and if there are any deserving of punishment, let 
him give it them. 

" A deacon doth not bless, neither doth he give the 
blessing, but he receiveth it from the bishop and the 
presbyter. He doth not baptize, neither doth he put 
on the eucharist. But when the bishop and the pres- 
byter have set on the eucharist the deacon giveth the 
cup, not as a priest, but as one who ministereth to the 
priest. There is no power in any other of the clergy to 
do the work of a deacon. 

" And a deaconess doth not bless, neither doth she do 
any of those things which the presbyters and deacons 
do, but she keepeth the doors only, and ministereth to 
the presbyters at the time of the baptism of women, 
because this is becoming. 

"A deacon can put out the subdeacon, and the readers 
and the singer and the deaconess, if occasion leads 
him, no presbyter indeed being there. A subdeacon 
has no power to put out a reader, or a singer, or a 



THE RISE OF HIERARCHY. 139 

deaconess, or a lay person, for he is a minister to the 
deacons." 1 

The churches also, though still retaining something 
of the independence of the first age, were beginning to' 
yield in some important respects to a centralized govern- 
ment under bishops. Bishops were still officers, not of 
many congregations, but of one. They were also selected 
for the office by the voice of the brotherhood of their own 
congregations. But a bishop could only be ordained 
by two or three bishops, and as there was only one 
bishop in each congregation, the ordination of a bishop 
necessitated the co-operation of the bishops of several 
other congregations. In proof of this I cite the fol- 
lowing : — 

"Additional Ordinance as to the Case of a Bishop ordained 
by one Bishop only. 

" It is necessary that the bishop should be ordained 
by three or two bishops ; but if one bishop hath ordained 
him, let him be anathematized. But if a necessity hath 
happened to any one that he should be ordained by 
one only, because they are not able to gather together 
on account of the persecution which is without, or on 
account of any other such like cause, let the permission 
from many other holy bishops be received for doing 
this which is requisite for him." 2 

A national primacy was already established and rec- 
ognized among the bishops. In proof I quote the 
following : — 

"The bishops of every nation ought to know who is 
first among them, and him they ought to esteem their 



1 Hip. and his Age, Vol. II. p. 41. 

2 The Church and House Book, Can. 72. Hip. and his Age 
Vol. II. p. 40. 



140 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

head, and not to do any great thing without his consent, 
but every one to manage only the affairs that belong to 
his own parish, and the country places and villages 
subject to it. But let him not either do anything with- 
out the consent of all ; for it is by this means that there 
will be unanimity, and God will be glorified by Christ 
in the Holy Spirit." ] 

" Let a synod of bishops be held twice in a year, and 
let them ask one another the doctrines of piety, and let 
them determine the ecclesiastical disputes that happen. 
Once in the fourth week of Pentecost, and again on the 
twelfth of the month Hyperberetacus, that is, according 
to the Romans, on the fourth before the Ides of 
October." 2 

If any one will candidly ponder these extracts, and 
many more which might be made to the same purpose, 
it seems to me he will admit without hesitation, that the 
constitution of the church indicated in them is certainly 
to be regarded, not as supplemental to the constitutions 
of the apostles, but as in strong and decisive contrast 
to them. Why do these arrangements of the ages 
immediately subsequent to the apostles distinctly pro- 
vide for the election of a clergy, and for inducting them 
into their respective offices? Why do they arrange 
them in three distinct orders and accurately define the 
qualifications and functions of each order? Why are 
the names descriptive of each order employed with 
undeviating accuracy, and never interchanged with one 
another ? Evidently because the exhibition of the rites 
of baptism and the Lord's Supper had become a purely 
clerical function, and because the clergy provided for 

1 The Ecclesiastical Canons of the Apostles, Can. 35. Hip. and 
his Age, Vol. II. p. S3. 

2 The same, Can. 3S. The same, p. 83. 



THE RISE OF HIERARCHY. 141 

the performance of this function existed in three dis- 
tinct orders, so that the function of any one order could 
not be performed by any other order. The definitions 
and the names accurately describe the things which 
really existed. Nothing of the sort is found in the 
apostolic records, only because the clerical function as 
it existed in the after age did not exist, and had never 
been thought of, and was therefore neither defined 
nor named. The constitutions of the after age are 
composed of a set of ideas which were a novelty in the 
church, the introduction of which had essentially modi- 
fied the arrangements of the apostles, though it had 
not yet entirely overturned them. No mode of criticism 
can be more groundless and unphilosophical than that 
which looks to these documents of the after age, either 
for a model of the apostolic church or of the church of 
the future. It seems to me that the mind is strangely 
warped and distorted, that can pass from the study of 
the New Testament to these documents of the subse- 
quent ages, without feeling that he has undergone a 
change of moral climate analogous to that of being 
transferred from the glorious sunshine of Italy to the 
fogs and mists and storms of the Arctic Circle. 

The next proposition to which the reader's attention 
is invited is, that the rites of baptism and the Lord's 
Supper were placed under the exclusive control of a 
priestly corporation, and thereby greatly perverted from 
their original aim. 

Sufficient proof of this proposition has perhaps 
been already given incidentally in discussing the pre- 
vious proposition. Excommunication meant exclusion 
from the Lord's Supper. The power to excommunicate 
belonged to the priesthood alone, primarily only to the 
bishop. Presbyters could only be qualified to offer the 
sacrifice of the eucharist by the laying on of the hands 






142 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

of the bishop, and through bishops and presbyters only 
could the laity (the " plebs," as they are significantly 
called) be admitted to "communicate," or in other 
words to receive the Lord's Supper. 

How great this deviation is from apostolic usage is 
abundantly apparent from what was said of the absence 
of any priestly function or priestly name in the apostolic 
churches. It may be said perhaps that this is a mere 
change of words, without implying any change of 
things. But I reply that such a change of phraseology 
is an unfailing indication of a corresponding change of 
things. The language employed in the canons of the 
subsequent ages is necessitated by the things which 
existed, and accurately describes them. The clergy 
was a priesthood. The essential idea of a priesthood 
is that of mediation between God and the rest of man- 
kind. The priestly function is that by which the men 
who exercise it become a medium of approach to God, 
by the intervention of which sinning, sorrowing human- 
ity obtains help from God not otherwise obtainable. 
In the churches of that age the rites of baptism and the 
Lord's Supper, especially the latter, were increasingly 
regarded as divinely appointed media, through which 
alone men could obtain the most important blessings 
from God. To these fountains of divine mercy, men 
could only gain access through the clergy. The order 
of men through whom alone the people could gain 
access to those fountains was in the highest sense a 
priesthood. They were fitly and most appropriately 
called priests, because they performed or were believed 
to perform the gravest of priestly functions. The 
words "priests," "priesthood," "sacerdotal office," 
came into those churches by a necessary law of lan- 
guage, because the things were there. 

On the other hand, the only reason which can be 



THE RISE OF HIERARCHY. 143 

assigned why such phraseology does not occur in the 
language of the New Testament is, that there were no 
ideas or usages in that age which required and justified 
its use. To throw these ideas backwards upon the age 
of Christ and his apostles, and read them between the 
lines of the New Testament, because we find them 
existing in a later and more superstitious age, is in the 
last degree unphilosophical, and unjust to our religion 
and its founder. Especially is this true since there is 
no difficulty whatever in discovering sources from which 
these ideas are likely to have come, having no connec- 
tion with the apostles. On these sources it is not ne- 
cessary to enlarge after what was said in relation to the 
ritualizing tendencies of the early church. A Greek or 
Roman pagan could not conceive of a religious observ- 
ance or a religion without priestly manipulation. Find- 
ing in Christianity when he embraced it the rites of 
baptism and the Lord's Supper, he would regard them 
as sadly lacking that flavor of sanctity, which was in 
his mind inseparably associated with priestly functions ; 
and he would very naturally seek to render their exhibi- 
tion more solemn and imposing by committing them to 
a priestly class, and observing them according to a 
priestly rubric. The ideas in which he had been edu- 
cated would predispose him to that materialistic inter- 
pretation of our Lord's words, " this is my body,'" and 
"this is my blood," which has cast a deep shade of 
superstition over so large a portion of the history of 
the church, — -'a shade which still beclouds the minds 
of a large majority of those who at this time bear the 
Christian name. Those words of Christ are frequently 
used in these very documents with a certain emphasis, 
which strongly favors the suspicion, that something of 
this materialistic construction was already gaining pos- 
session of the mind of the church. The liturgy in use, 



144 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

in its relations to this subject, would certainly require 
little change to accommodate it to the gross materialism 
of the Middle Ages. 

It only remains to present the evidence which justi- 
fies the assertion that the church of those ages was 
deeply corrupted by ascetic ideas of celibacy, and inter- 
fered with the relations of the sexes otherwise than in 
the interest of moral purity, and greatly to the injury of 
domestic virtue. As we study the literature of that age 
v/e are almost constantly inspired with sentiments of 
reverence and awe, as we walk among moral scenery in 
which persecution and martyrdom are always the most 
conspicuous objects ; and it is no pleasant task to point 
out follies and grievous errors of those holy men, and 
vices of the age which inevitably resulted from those 
errors. But the purpose I have in view cannot be 
accomplished without determining the relations of that 
age with impartial justice to primitive Christianity on 
the one hand, and to the churches of the following ages 
on the other. The anti-Nicene church cannot be 
regarded as the completely developed model of the true 
church of Christ, of which the apostolic church is only 
an imperfect and rudimentary form, without doing the- 
greatest injustice to what went before it and what fol- 
lowed after it. We cannot fix its true place in history 
without clearly indicating the greatness of the contrast, 
which is apparent on almost every page of its literature, 
between it and the primitive church. This contrast 
cannot be fairly exhibited if we omit all mention of that 
deepest of all the stains which disfigure it, its doctrine 
of celibacy. No devout writer of the present age can 
attempt to speak the truth on this subject without deep 
regret. The Christian world is not prepared to accept 
an undisguised utterance on this subject, without admin- 
istering a frown of rebuke to the audacious writer who 



THE RISE OF HIERARCHY. 145 

attempts such an exhibition. Such a rebuke is un- 
called for and unmerited. We shall never know the 
true history of the church of Christ, till we are will- 
ing that even this martyr age should be seen as it 
really was, — an age of great virtue indeed, but also 
of such follies and vices that, in the construction of the 
churches of the present and the future, we have more 
reason to shun than to imitate its example. I claim 
therefore a patient and respectful hearing, while I draw 
aside the veil a little way, and only a little way, in 
respect to the subject now under consideration. I first 
invite attention to the following extract from Cyprian, 
premising that by virgins he means those who had 
bound themselves by vows of perpetual celibacy and 
chastity. 

" My discourse is now to the virgins, for whom my 
care is the greater in proportion as their glory is more 
eminent. That is the flower cf ecclesiastical growth, 
the beauty and ornament of spiritual grace, the glad 
temper, the entire and incorruptcd work of praise and 
honor, the image of God corresponding to the sanctity 
of the Lord, the more illustrious portion of the flock of 
Christ. The glorious fruitfulness of the mother church 
rejoices through these, and in these abundantly flour- 
ishes ; and the more a copious virginity adds to its 
number, so much the more the joy of the mother 
increases." A few lines further down he proceeds, 
" Nor indeed is this caution and fear vain and useless 
which provides the way of safety, which guards the 
divine and vital precepts, so that they who have conse- 
crated themselves to Christ, and retiring from carnal 
concupiscence as much in flesh as in spirit, have vowed 
to God, may consummate their work, nor any more 
desire to be ornamented or to please any one except 



146 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

their Lord, from whom they look for the reward of 
virginity." 1 

A very simple method may be suggested by which 
any one acquainted with the Latin language may become 
entirely convinced that Cyprian wrote at a time and in 
a community deeply imbued with the doctrine of ascetic 
celibacy; and that he himself accepted that doctrine 
and advocated it with great enthusiasm. That method 
is to turn to the word " virgines " in any good index of 
his writings, and run the eye along the several topics 
embraced under it. I have such an index before me. 
In it I find such phraseology as the following, "vir- 
gins consecrated to Christ," "chaste virgins persevering 
are the equals of the angels of God," "they already 
possess the glory of the resurrection," "the reward of 
the virgins," " the praise of virginity," " Christ the Lord 
and head of the virgins," " the Lord does not command 
but exhorts to virginity." Many of the topics which 
occur under that word I have omitted only because 
delicacy forbids me to express them in plain English. 
On turning to the various passages referred to in the 
index, they would be found to contain evidence the 
most unquestionable, that the doctrine of the superior 
sanctity of a state of celibacy as compared with married 
life was as fully adopted and as earnestly advocated by 
Cyprian as by any Christian writer of any age, and that 
the practices of the church were thoroughly conformed 
to it ; that young persons of both sexes were most 
earnestly invited and urged to consecrate themselves 
to such a life, as securing to them a degree of honor 
and dignity in the church of God and of glory and 
blesssedness in the future life, to which the married 
could never attain, and that great numbers yielding to 

1 De Habitu Virginum, III. et IV., Paris edition. 



THE RISE OF HIERARCHY. 147 

such persuasions were professing to lead such a life. 
The evidence is also sorrowfully abundant, that these 
doctrines and professions were already abundantly pro- 
ducing those bitter fruits which must always be expected 
from such violations of nature and of the ordinances of 
God. Licentious practices did prevail to an alarming 
degree among these professors of peculiar sanctity. 
Cyprian deplored this state of things, and was sensible 
of the great dangers to which young persons in such 
circumstances were exposed. He earnestly sought to 
apply a remedy, but his zeal for the superior sanctity of 
a state of celibacy was such, that he never thought for a 
moment of remedying the evil by returning to the law 
and order of nature, but only sought to prevent it by 
placing the virgins under a more stringent discipline. 
These assertions cannot be made good by quotations 
without wearying the reader, and disgusting him with 
the indelicacy of the subject. If any one wishes further 
evidence he can easily obtain it, for the writings of this 
author are accessible in the English language. 1 

To the following quotation it is proper to call partic- 
ular attention. Addressing the virgins he says, " You 
have already begun to be what you shall be hereafter. 
You are already in possession in the present life of the 
glory of the resurrection, you are passing through this 
life without contracting any of its contagion. While 
you are persevering virgins and chaste, you are equal to 
the angels of God." 2 

Tertullian also furnishes evidence sadly abundant of 
the prevalence of the same doctrine. He is more cau- 
tious than Cyprian. He seeks to avoid any appear- 

1 Epi. LXII. Col. 375,376, Paris edition. Liber de Habitu 
Virginum, XXXIII. Col. 475,476. 

2 Idem, XXXII. Col. 475. 



1 48 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

ance of condemning or disparaging marriage. He 
wrote very largely against second marriages and repre- 
sents them, if not as immoral, certainly as disgraceful 
and degrading. He wrote a letter to his wife of the 
dimensions of a considerable book, the sole object of 
which was to dissuade her from a second marriage in 
case she should survive him. His whole argument pro- 
ceeds upon the assumption that all marriage, though 
permitted on account of the weakness of human nature, 
implies a certain loss of sanctity. He constantly recog- 
nizes a sanctity which is quite distinct from moral 
purity, if I may so say, a corporeal or material sanctity, 
which is yet eminently pleasing to God. It is in the 
interest of such sanctity chiefly that he dissuades from 
second marriages. The same notion of sanctity is 
abundantly found in other portions of his writings. It 
is exceedingly difficult to make particular quotations 
which will fairly represent the spirit of his writings in 
relation to this subject. Perhaps nothing better can 
be clone than to give in English the following sentence, 
and transfer to the margin of the page the passage from 
which it is taken. Speaking of certain women whose 
husbands had died before them, and who had remained 
unmarried for the sake of a higher sanctity, he says, 
" Thus they gained possession of the everlasting good 
of the Lord, and by not marrying now in this world 
they are reckoned of the angelic family." l 

1 Et tu adversus consilia haec ejus, adhibe sororum nostrarum 
exempla, quarum nomina penes Dominum, quae nullam formae vel 
aetatis occasionem praemissis maritis sanctitati anteponunt : malunt 
enim Deo nubere, Deo speciosae, Deo sunt puellae : cum illo vivunt, 
cum illo sermocinantur: ilium diebus et noctibus tractant: orationes 
suas velut dotes Domino assignant : ab eodem dignationem "Celut 
munera maritalia, quotiescunque desiclerant, consequuntur. Sic 
aeternum sibi bonum Domini occupav'erunt, ac jam in terris non 



THE RISE OF HIERARCHY 



49 



It is not necessary to weary the reader's patience or 
shock his taste with more quotations on this disagree- 
able and painful subject. Perhaps it would have been 
wiser to have disposed of the whole subject by referring 
to a single work of one of the most eminent English 
authors of the present century, Isaac Taylor's " Ancient 
Christianity." His is deservedly an admired and hon- 
ored name in our religious literature • but this work is 
not unfrequently referred to with some degree of bitter- 
ness and even contempt. No good reason for so treat- 
ing it is apparent. It has never been shown that its 
representations are unfair or untrue. It has been 
treated with severity only because there is a very large 
and influential party in Christendom, to the adherents 
of which, the truths which he has uttered are unpala- 
table and unwelcome. If men have a theory of the 
church which requires them to accept the Nicene or the 
ante-Nicene church as the perfected model of that 
which Jesus founded, such a work as that above referred 
to will not be a very welcome contribution to our relig- 
ious literature. But no man who has candidly read the 
work can say, that its spirit is not devout and reveren- 
tial, or that the author has not make good his position, 
that the church of those early ages was as deeply imbued 
with the ascetic doctrine of celibacy as any portion of 
Christian history. 



nubendo, de familia angelica deputantur. Talium exemplis foemi- 
narum ad aemulationem te continentioe exercens, spiritali affectione 
carnalem illam concupiscentiam humabis; temporalia et volatica 
desideria formae vcl a^tatis inimicantium . honorum compensatione 
delendo. Liber I. Ad Uxorem. Opera Omnia Tertulliani, Tom. I. 
The reader desirous of more information concerning Tertullian's 
views of this subject should consult, in addition to that already 
referred to, Liber de Velandis Virginibus, Liber de Exhortatione 
Castitatis and Liber de Monogamia. 



150 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

No devout Christian, certainly no sincere Protestant, 
can contemplate this fact without great sorrow. But 
there is no good reason why any one should feel that 
utter sickness of heart in respect to it which many 
manifest, as though to admit it to be true were to sur- 
render the very citadel of our faith. No such inference 
legitimately follows. Two considerations in respect to it 
should not be for one moment lost sight of. Such a state 
of things is not the legitimate product of the teachings 
or example either of Jesus or the apostles ; and causes 
existed outside of the church, from which just such a 
development not only should have been expected, but 
was well nigh inevitable. 

There are certain allusions to the subject of marriage 
in the New Testament which some have claimed to be 
the origin from which this doctrine of celibacy is logi- 
cally derived. It is necessary that these should be 
examined. The first and perhaps the most important 
of them is our Lord's answer to his disciples, when they 
objected to the stringency of his teachings respecting 
divorce. " If the case of the man," said they, " be so 
with his wife, it is not good to marry." l The answer 
of Jesus no further discountenances marriage or com- 
mends celibacy than by admitting, what certainly no 
wise man would deny, that one may sometimes properly 
abstain from marriage for the sake of greater efficiency 
in promoting the kingdom of God, "for the kingdom 
of heaven's sake." The same subject is discussed by 
Paul in his First Epistle to the Corinthians. 2 The teach- 
ings of Paul are, I think, precisely coincident with those 
of Jesus himself, in the passage above referred to. No 
candid interpretation can find in that chapter any com- 
mendation of celibacy, as a state of peculiar sanctity. 

1 Matt, xix: 9-12 2 1 Cor. vii. 



THE RISE OF HIERARCHY. 



J5 1 



That idea is not, I am persuaded, of Scriptural origin. 
One cannot well read the chapter in question, with a 
sound and healthy mind and heart without admiring 
the sober and robust views of the apostle, on a subject 
upon which there is so much in ancient literature which 
is morbid. It is impossible to point out in it any trace 
of the doctrine of the superior sanctity of unmarried 
life, or any intimation that marriage is a degradation. 
If any one will compare what Paul says of marriage 
with the volumes which Tertullian and Cyprian have 
written on the subject, he can hardly fail to perceive, 
that the two things compared have nothing in common. 
The apostle does indeed advise abstinence from mar- 
riage under certain conditions, but the reasons which 
he assigns are altogether personal and prudential, not 
general. He knew nothing of the "holy virgins," noth- 
ing of the equality of those living in celibacy to the 
angels, nothing of the glorious rewards of virginity. 
All this is patristic, not Pauline. He saw in marriage 
and the purities of married life the only safeguard of 
ordinary humanity against the temptations to degrading 
vice to which it is exposed, and in great plainness of 
speech recommends its adoption. His view of second 
marriages is worthy of particular notice, as in very strong 
contrast with those of the writers of subsequent ages. 
Instead of uttering one word in disparagement of them, 
he explicitly declares, that the woman whose husband 
is dead "is at liberty to be married to whom she will." 
In short no one could ever see ascetic celibacy in this 
chapter, unless his mind was already imbued with it 
from other sources. 

It is probable that the fact that among the qualifica- 
tions for an overseer of the church as given by Paul, he 
recommends that he should be the " husband of one 



152 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

wife," l and that in speaking of those who should be 
enrolled as widows to be supported by the church, he 
mentions as one of the requisites, "having been the wife 
of one man," 2 has really exerted a greater influence on 
the question than, any other allusion to the subject in 
the New Testament. If any one will consult commen- 
tators of reputation on these passages, he will find very 
considerable diversity of opinion as to their meaning. 
Whether the apostle intends to condemn polygamy or 
the having of more than one wife at the same time, or a 
second marriage after the dissolution of the first by 
death, or to insist on marriage as a necessary qualifica- 
tion for holding office in the church, is not entirely 
clear. And between these three opinions commentators 
are divided. The requirement in respect to the widow — 
that she must have been the wife of one man — seems to 
admit only of the interpretation that she must have 
been but once married. And yet this interpretation is 
by no means free from difficulty. If Paul meant to say 
that a woman by contracting a second marriage would 
render herself unworthy of the care and support of the 
church in case of a second widowhood, how does it 
happen that he says in this very chapter, " I will, there- 
fore, that the younger women " (meaning as the con- 
nection clearly shows younger widows) "marry, bear 
children, guide the house, give none occasion to the 
adversary to speak reproachfully " ? If he regarded 
second marriages as in such a sense degrading as to 
bring a woman under such a disqualification to receive 
the care and sympathy of the church, he would surely 
have reminded them of it, and dissuaded them from in. 
curring it. Cyprian would certainly never have allowed 
such an occasion to pass without at least suggesting 

1 1 Tim. iii : 2 ; Titus, i, 6. ' 2 1 Tim. v : 9. 



THE RISE OF HIERARCHY. 1 53 

" the sanctity " of continence. It is plain Paul knew 
nothing of any such sanctity, or he would have sug- 
gested it. This consideration is all the more forcible 
from the fact that, as already shown, the same apostle 
in writing to the Corinthians had, in the most unquali- 
fied manner, asserted the liberty of a woman to contract 
a second marriage " with whom she will, only in the 
Lord.'' Strange liberty this, to do that by which she 
would render herself unworthy of the sympathy of the 
church in her widowhood ! 

This consideration is decisive to prove, that whatever 
be the true interpretation of these phrases, they cannot 
have been intended to discountenance and disparage 
second marriages. If Paul meant to advise that per- 
sons having been twice married should not be appointed 
to office in the church, it must have been for some other 
reason than disapprobation of such marriages. One 
commentator of good repute suggests that the emphasis 
of Paul's instructions in reference to the qualifications 
of bishops or presbyters should be largely placed on the 
one first mentioned, "blameless," or without reproach, 
and that this suggests the true reason for what immedi- 
ately follows, " the husband of one wife." He shows by 
quotations from ancient literature that in that age, to 
have contracted more than one marriage was regarded 
as disgraceful, as indicating a character too much under 
the influence of sensual appetite. He thinks that the 
apostle advised that men who had been more than once 
married should not be appointed to office in the church, 
because such appointments would impair the respec- 
tability of the church in a community in which this 
prejudice was widely prevalent. It is hardly credible, 
considering the depth and earnestness of Paul's char- 
acter, that he could have attached importance to so 
superficial a view of the subject. 



154 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

May not another interpretation of this language be 
admissible, differing from either of the three above 
referred to ? When the apostle insists that the bishop 
must not be given to wine, we easily understand him to 
mean, that he must be an example of the virtue of tem- 
perance. When he says he must not be greedy of 
filthy lucre, we understand him to mean that he must be 
an example of wisdom and liberality in respect to the 
use of this world's goods. When therefore he insists 
on his being the' husband of one wife, why may we not 
equally understand him to mean, that he must be an 
example of tlfe domestic virtues, dwelling with one wife 
in all purity and fidelity, quite irrespective of the ques- 
tion whether he had been married more than once or 
not ? He must be the true and faithful husband of one 
woman. This interpretation is equally applicable to 
the " wife of one husband," and in perfect harmony 
with the spirit and aim of the whole passage, and with 
what the apostle hath said elsewhere of marriage. To 
me it seems a just interpretation of the language. 

To a mind soundly imbued with the spirit and teach- 
ings of the Scriptures, the ascetic celibacy which had 
certainly gained wide prevalence in the first half of the 
third century, and was then no recent novelty, must 
appear in strange and painful contrast to those sound 
and sober views of marriage and the relations of the 
sexes generally, which everywhere meet us in the New 
Testament. It is a question of great interest by what 
causes this great sad revolution was produced, a revolu- 
tion so disastrous to domestic virtue in that age and 
in so many ages that followed it. It is not necessary 
to go far to find those causes. Want of space forbids 
entering at large upon that field of inquiry. It is only 
necessary to say in this place that the asceticism of 
early Christianity was a direct outgrowth of the Gnostic 



THE RISE OF HIERARCHY. 155 

philosophy, which gained a wide prevalence over Europe 
and Western Asia and Northern Africa in the times of 
which I am writing. For a more complete discussion 
of the subject than I am able to give, yet far less com- 
plete than it deserves, the reader is referred to Isaac 
Taylor's " Ancient Christianity," already mentioned in 
this chapter. 

That philosophy maintains that the union of an intel- 
ligent soul with a material body is not the work of the 
Supreme Ruler of the universe, but of an inferior and 
hostile divinity, the creator of this world. It maintains 
that the subjection of the soul to those appetites and 
passions which result from its connection with the body 
is a degradation, and the source of moral depravity. It 
hence infers the necessity of a rigid mortification of all 
our bodily appetites as the only means of recovering for 
the human soul its proper dignity, virtue and happiness. 
According to this system asceticism becomes the only 
psssible instrument of reformation. At a very early 
date in the history of Christianity, the church encoun- 
tered this philosophy, first in Egypt and Syria, but in 
greater or less degree over all Christendom. The fun- 
damental doctrine of this philosophy, the church resisted 
as a fatal heresy. But while resisting, she could not 
escape its fatal influence. That influence was like some 
pestilential contagion originating it may be in the filthy 
and miserable homes and squalid haunts of poverty and 
vice, but overflowing and pervading the palaces of the 
rich, the great and the learned, and involving all in a 
common calamity. In like manner the Gnostic philoso- 
phy invaded and poisoned the whole western world, and 
exerted its blighting influence almost equally upon 
those who resisted and those who accepted it. This 
philosophy, and not the Scriptures either of the Old 
Testament or the New, is the source of the ascetic 



156 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

celibacy of the early church. It was not Christianity, 
but a fiery trial through which Christianity must pass. 

So far is it from being a matter of wonder, that these 
errors arose in the church, that they were foreseen and 
distinctly predicted. " Forbidding to marry and com- 
manding to abstain from meats, which God had created 
to be received with thanksgiving of them which believe 
and know the truth " are the characteristic features of 
that asceticism which invaded the early church. Paul 
plainly mentions them among the doctrines of those 
false teachers who were to arise in latter times. 1 In 
his Second Epistle to the Thessalonians he seemed sad 
and depressed in spirit in view of a "falling away" 
which was coming, and even declared that the " mystery 
of iniquity " doth already work. 2 

It is unnecessary to cite particular passages to prove 
what no one at all acquainted with the subject will deny, 
that, in addition to the grave departures from the teach- 
ings and example of the primitive church which have 
been already specified, before the middle of the third 
century, the churches had already lost in a great degree 
that local independence which certainly did exist in the 
primitive age, and had adopted in its stead provincial 
or national centralization under the government of 
bishops. There are also not wanting indications of 
decided tendencies towards the acceptance of the pri- 
macy of the bishop of Rome, although it was by no 
means generally acknowledged. The primacy of metro- 
politan bishops was already recognized. 

The errors which have been pointed out, as having 
arisen in the second and third centuries, are seminal 
principles, from which a hierarchy must inevitably grow. 
When once it was assumed, that the officers of the 



1 1 Tim. iv : 3. 2 2 Thess. ii : 3-10. 



THE RISE OF HIERARCHY. 1 57 

church were a clergy, empowered by the laying on of 
hands to perform the exclusive function of exhibiting 
baptism and the Lord's Supper to the people, they were 
invested with a degree of influence in all the affairs of 
the church, which must have been nearly irresistible. 
The men who were believed to hold the only key to 
these sacred rites, with power to open and shut the 
door at their own discretion, could not fail to have every- 
thing in the church in their own way. They would 
soon be looked upon with so much awe and reverence, 
that no layman would think of approaching to equality 
with them in respect to any matter pertaining to religion. 
When the clergy that was endowed with this function 
was constituted in three orders, rising one above the 
other in well-defined gradation, another exceedingly 
important element of hierarchal power was introduced. 
This again was greatly intensified by recognizing the 
bishop as possessing the exclusive power of ordination, 
so that only by the laying on of his hands could any 
one acquire the authority to minister in the rites of 
baptism and the Lord's Supper. By this means the 
bishop acquired a very extraordinary degree of influence, 
both over the lower orders of the clergy, and the whole 
Christian brotherhood. 

The influence thus acquired by the bishop was again 
greatly augmented by the fact that the bishop could not 
be inducted into his high office by the election of the 
congregation, and by the laying on of the hands of 
the presbyters of that congregation, as certainly was the 
custom in the churches of the apostles, but must be 
ordained by two or three bishops of other congregations. 
A principle unknown to apostolic times was established, 
that the power of investing men by the laying on of 
hands with the gift of ministering in baptism and the 
Lord's Supper never came up from the brotherhood 



I58 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

through the presbyters, but always down from the 
"bench of bishops." Here was a hierarchy fully organ- 
ized. A greater departure from the usages of the 
apostolic church is scarcely possible. The people 
would soon cease to inquire whence the bishops derived 
the power they conferred, and would assume that those 
powers came by direct succession from the apostles, 
and by the immediate gift of Christ himself. The way 
was therefore prepared for obtaining ready credence of 
the fiction of the perpetual corporation of bishops com- 
posed of the official successors of the apostles. 

It is evident, that the germ of this whole hierarchal 
system is the power of the keys in the hands of the 
clergy, not as it was understood by Jesus himself when 
he promised that power to Peter, but in the sense in 
which it has been so long understood in the church as 
hierarchically constituted. Grant to a clergy the exclu- 
sive power of the keys as just explained, and that clergy 
will more and more absorb to itself the teaching func- 
tion also. It will be readily admitted by the people, 
that they who have the sacred rites of the church in 
their exclusive keeping must know better than other 
men the nature of those rites, the value of the blessings 
to be derived from them, and the qualifications neces- 
sary to a participation in these blessings. The instruc- 
tions of such a clergy, respecting these rites and their 
relation to salvation, will therefore be received by the 
people with implicit faith, as invested with authority 
little short of divine. The clergy themselves will be 
under a constant temptation to magnify the importance 
of observing these rites, and to cultivate in the minds 
of the people feelings of superstitious awe in respect to 
them. Under such circumstances, it was to be expected 
that these rites would be more and more corrupted 
from their original simplicity, and become to an increas- 



THE RISE OF HIERARCHY. 159 

ing extent the ready instruments of hierarchal power. 
Finding therefore as we have done, that seed already 
planted in that early age, and taking deep root, there 
is no occasion to wonder at its gigantic growth, or at 
the baleful shadow it has cast upon the Christian church 
and name through so many ages. What I affirm is, 
that that seed was not planted by Christ and the apos- 
tles, but by the enemy that sowed tares among the 
wheat in the corrupter ages that followed. 

The gravest task imposed upon the ecclesiastical 
historian of the nineteenth century is to determine in 
what relation the church of the ante-Nicene age really 
stands to the church of the apostles. If it can be suc- 
cessfully maintained, that it is the legitimate develop- 
ment of the church of the apostles, then there is no 
escaping the conclusion, that Jesus Christ and his apos- 
tles are logically responsible for the church of the Mid- 
dle Ages, as well as for the church of the ante-Nicene 
period ; for it is vain to deny that the ante-Nicene 
church is logically responsible for that which came in 
the following ages. On the other hand if, as has been 
maintained in this chapter, the ante-Nicene church is to 
be regarded as standing in strong contrast to the apos- 
tolic church, presenting a variety of ideas, usages and 
constitutional principles derived not from Christ and 
the apostles, but from the corrupted Judaism and the 
hoary superstitions of paganism, from one or the other 
of which Christianity made all its converts, then Christ 
and his apostles are not responsible for any of the cor- 
ruptions that followed in any succeeding age • and they 
may be looked to as the source of reforming power, by 
which the church of the present and the church of the 
future may be purified and made to conform to the 
grandly free and simple conception of the founder. 



l6o THE KEYS OF SECT. 



CHAPTER II, 

HIERARCHY IN ITS MATURITY. 

In the preceding chapter we were lingering in the 
midst of the scenery of the infant church, while it was 
yet experiencing the persecuting violence of its pagan 
enemies, and engaged in a constant struggle to main- 
tain its existence. In that survey of its condition, wc 
were compelled, however reluctantly, to acknowledge 
that its constitution had been in some very important 
respects modified by surrounding influences, and that 
some ideas and usages had been introduced into it by 
the multitude of converts it had won from a corrupted 
Judaism, and from the ancient paganism of Greece 
and Rome and Phoenicia and Egypt, which were 
utterly foreign to the church of the apostles. The 
inquiry was also raised, What results were likely to 
come in after ages from the new elements which were 
thus introduced ? In this chapter it is proposed to 
inquire whether the apprehensions which were there 
expressed were verified in the subsequent history of 
the church. 

Let us then transfer our point of observation forward 
in the progress of the ages, over a period of eight hun- 
dred years, from the third to the eleventh century. 
The western Roman Empire has long since passed away. 
Rome is no longer the Imperial City. Instead of the 
emperor, a new power sits enthroned in the city of the 



HIERARCHY IN ITS MATURITY. l6l 

seven hills. The sceptre is wielded, not by an emperor, 
but by a priest. He is indeed a temporal sovereign, 
but it is only over a small tract of Italian territory, in 
the near vicinity of what was once the Imperial City. 
In the capacity of a temporal sovereign, he is inade- 
quate to any aggressive enterprise, and able to defend 
bis little dominion only by skilfully contracted alliances 
with other and more powerful states. And yet that 
petty sovereign, by a subtle force hitherto unknown to 
history, wields, from the Danube to the farthest extremity 
of the British Isles, and from Mount Atlas and the cata- 
racts of the Nile to the Baltic, a power which Rome 
could never equal in the times of her mightiest em- 
perors. The sovereign that exercises that power is 
Hildebrand, Pope Gregory VII. He is no descendant 
of the Cassars, nor yet of the barbarous chieftains by 
whom the Caesars were vanquished. He is the son of a 
carpenter, educated by the kindness of an uncle, 
brought to the notice of men in power only by his 
talents and personal qualities, first the favorite of two 
successive popes, then the master-spirit that procured 
the election of the two next in succession, and governed 
Christendom by his influence over them, and finally 
himself elevated to the pontifical throne, to rule Europe 
with a rod of iron. One grand scheme for aggrandizing 
the papal power filled and fired his soul. On the one 
hand, he sought to make himself and his successors 
entirely independent of all secular and civil powers in 
whatever land, in appointing all the dignitaries and 
officers of the church, and inducting them into their 
offices, thus giving to the papal government of the 
whole Christian church, as it was called, and supposed 
to be, the centralized compactness of a great empire. 
On the other hand he claimed to occupy a. position 
superior to that of all secular rulers, and actually exer- 
ii 



162 L' THE KEYS OF SECT. 

cised the power of dethroning kings and emperors, and 
releasing their subjects from all the obligations of their 
allegiance ; and he succeeded in obtaining such a recog- 
nition of these claims, as enabled him to inspire terror in 
the hearts of the most powerful monarchs in Christendom. 

The high pretensions of Pope Gregory VII., and the 
awe and terror which by means of them he was able to 
inspire in his contemporaries, are so notorious, that it is 
unnecessary to quote any authorities in support of the 
assertions just made. I am concerned at present with 
the inquiry, what the source was of that mysterious 
power by which this man held Europe in awe, and 
struck terror to the hearts of the proudest monarchs on 
earth. To answer this inquiry is to give the key, not 
only of many centuries of European history, but of the 
government of the church from Constantine to the 
present time. It was simply and only what has been 
known in church history as the "power of the keys." 

The history of those times renders the truth of this 
assertion exceedingly apparent. Pope Gregory VII. 
was a very zealous reformer of certain abuses in the 
church, especially of all violations of the strict chastity 
of the clergy, whether by marriage or concubinage, and 
of all simoniacal practices. Henry IV., Emperor of 
Germany, and some of his predecessors had exercised 
the right of presenting incumbents to vacant sees, to 
the prejudice of the immemorial right of the clergy and 
people to elect, and had themselves assumed the pre- 
rogative of investing such incumbents with the badges of 
their ecclesiastical authority, which had hitherto exclu- 
sively belonged to the metropolitan, on whom the right 
of ordaining devolved. Henry had not only exercised 
the right of presenting to vacant benefices, but had laid 
himself open to the charge of simony by having notori- 
ously sold them to the highest bidder. In his efforts to 



HIERARCHY IN ITS MATURITY. 1 63 

put an end to these usurpations and abuses, the pope 
was brought into fierce conflict with the emperor. 

Gregory published his edict against simony. The 
emperor complimented the zeal of the pope for the 
reform of the church. The pope demanded the privi- 
lege of holding councils throughout Germany, to give 
effect to his decrees. Henry was quite conscious of 
being himself the chief offender in this matter, and 
therefore refused permission. The pope held a council 
at Rome, deposed several high dignitaries of the church, 
and excommunicated five of the imperial court, whose 
services the emperor had employed in his simoniacal 
transactions. Henry admitted the existence of simony, 
and sought to pacify the pope by declaring his intention 
to discountenance it in the future. 

Hildebrand was not to be baffled thus. The energy 
of his nature was fully roused, and he made haste to 
push matters to extremities. He sent legates into 
Germany, bearing positive orders to the emperor to 
present himself forthwith at Rome, to clear himself 
before the pope and his council of various charges 
alleged against him by his subjects. This high-handed 
demand was without any precedent. Accordingly Henry 
treated it as a wanton insult, and retorted it by assem- 
bling at Worms a council of some twenty German 
bishops (some of whom were already embroiled with 
Gregory), who pronounced Hildebrand unworthy of his 
dignity, and deposed him. Gregory in a full assembly 
of one hundred and ten bishops excommunicated 
Henry, declared that he had forfeited the kingdoms of 
Germany and Italy, and absolved his subjects from 
their allegiance. 

The control of the pope over the allegiance of sub- 
jects to their civil rulers was hitherto supported by no 
precedent ; but the event showed that it was far enough 



164 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

from being mere brutum fulmen. Much discontent 
already existed among the emperor's German subjects. 
Insurrections broke out in various quarters against him, 
as soon as the edict of excommunication was promul- 
gated among his subjects ; and there were some among 
his best friends whose fidelity was to some extent para- 
lyzed by the papal anathema under which he had fallen. 
He was soon forced to consent to an arrangement for 
the settlement of the difficulty most disadvantageous to 
himself, by which the claims and wrongs of both were 
to be submitted to the pope. A council was to be held 
at Augsbourg, at which the pope was to preside. In 
the mean time Henry was to remain suspended from 
his royal dignity. 

The emperor soon became so much alarmed at the 
prospect of being obliged publicly to submit to the pope 
in the midst of his own subjects, that he determined to 
escape from that necessity by privately submitting to 
his authority, and thus obtaining the removal of the 
anathema which he found to be crushing him down 
with destructive weight. For this purpose he crossed 
the Alps with a few attendants during the severity of 
an inclement winter, and proceeded to the fortress of 
Canossa in Italy, where the pope then had his residence. 
In penitential garments, he presented himself at the 
gate of the fortress as a sinner and a suppliant, humbly 
requesting to be admitted to the presence of the pope, 
and to receive absolution. For three days the proudest 
monarch in Europe, with bare head and feet, and unpro- 
tected from the season, waited fasting before the walls, 
in solitary and hopeless humiliation. He was then 
permitted to approach the pope, and receive the abso- 
lution for which he had submitted to all this hardship 
and utter degradation, both from his personal and regal 
dignity. Nor was he even yet restored to the titles 



HIERARCHY IN ITS MATURITY. 1 65 

and dignities of royalty, from which this Roman priest 
had deposed him. 1 ' 

It is not necessary to our purpose to follow the his- 
tory further. What was the secret of the power which 
this man Hildebrand possessed over the proudest 
monarch in Europe ? It is nothing to the purpose to 
say, that Henry was weakened by discontents already 
existing among his subjects, and for that reason less 
able to cope with his adversary. That is, of course, 
obvious. But why was the pope an element of any 
importance to the situation? Why could his edict 
weaken Henry with his friends, and make his enemies 
strong against him ? Why did a powerful monarch 
think himself under a necessity of making his peace 
with this Roman priest, at the expense of all this 
humiliation, peril and hardship ? One answer only 
can be given. The pope was believed to possess the 
"keys of the kingdom of heaven." He, in the opinion 
of all Europe, could open and no man could shut, and 
shut and no man could open. In the plenitude of his 
priestly power, he had cut off the emperor from all par- 
ticipation in the rites of baptism and the Lord's Supper, 
by which alone, in the unanimous opinion of the age, 
the blessing and favor of God can come to any man, 
and the curse of God was believed to be resting on him, 
which the pope alone could remove. His subjects 
regarded him as a being accursed of God, and were 
stricken with superstitious awe and dread at the thought 
of recognizing as their sovereign a man who was thus 
accursed. 

That power by which this man Hildebrand made 
monarchs tremble on their thrones had been growing 
for ages ; but it had grown from a single root, and from 

1 Waddington's Church Hist., Chap. XVI , Sect. II. 



l66 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

that root it still drew all its vigor. It was first assumed, 
that there must be in the Christian church a clergy 
empowered by the laying on of hands to dispense to 
the people these rites which Jesus Christ instituted ; 
next that this clergy necessarily existed in a hierarchy 
of three orders, — bishops, presbyters, and deacons j 
next, that this clergy was a priesthood, and the Lord's 
Supper an offering, a sacrifice which could only be 
performed by the intervention of their priestly function ; 
next, that bishops only could, by the laying on of their 
hands, confer this priestly power ; next, that metropolitan 
bishops were invested with a primacy over all the other 
bishops of a province or a nation ; and finally, that the 
bishop of Rome was invested with a primacy of all 
other bishops, and over the whole church of God under 
heaven. 

What I distinctly affirm is, that not one of these 
assumptions receives the slightest support from the 
apostolic records contained in the New Testament- 
The whole conception of the power of the keys, as 
Hildebrand wielded it to the terror of Europe, is as 
shameless a perversion as human ingenuity ever in- 
vented, of the words of Jesus addressed to Peter, which 
have been carefully examined in a former chapter. I 
also affirm with equal confidence, that all the assump- 
tions enumerated in the previous paragraph except the 
last were not only adopted by the church of the second 
and third centuries, but were deeply rooted in it. The 
proof of this was given in the previous chapter. The 
church of Hildebrand is but a natural and normal 
development of the ante-Nicene church as exhibited by 
Bunsen in his " Hippolytus and his Age." 

When first the functions of bishops began to be 
accurately defined and their powers to be magnified, 
the idea of a succession to the apostolic office was not 



HIERARCHY IN ITS MATURITY. 167 

claimed nor thought of. So far as my examination has 
extended, the idea does not occur in the remaining 
documents of the ante-Nicene age. But the mind of 
the age was deeply imbued with the idea of the hierar- 
chal organization of powers. It was soon held, that 
bishops only could ordain bishops, that the power of 
the presbyter to officiate at the eucharistic sacrifice 
came down to him from the bishops. The next assump- 
tion was very natural, that the bishops must have de- 
rived their powers from the apostles. It was not proved 
from Scripture or history. It was assumed. The in- 
structions of Paul to Timothy and Titus had doubtless 
at this point exerted very great influence. But they 
entirely fail to meet the case ; for there is not the slight- 
est intimation that Timothy and Titus ever claimed, or 
that Paul ever claimed for them, any power to qualify 
a clergy by the laying on of their hands to exhibit the 
rites of baptism and the Lord's Supper. Such a power 
the bishops of the second and third centuries certainly 
did claim and exercise. Whence could they have de- 
rived it but from the apostles ? To a people already 
accustomed to the undisputed exercise of this power, 
its apostolic origin must have seemed a matter of course, 
while to us it seems incredible and impossible. In the 
same manner it would be assumed without inquiry, that 
Jesus himself had conferred this exclusive power on 
the apostles. It is assumption from first to last ; as- 
sumption then and assumption now. 

It was first assumed, not only without proof but 
against proof, that an official administration was neces- 
sary to the proper observance of the Lord's Supper ; 
then that the power to perform this official function is 
conferred by the laying on of hands ; then that this 
power is conferred by the laying on of the bishop's 
hands ; and finally, that all these powers must have been 



1 68 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

derived from the apostles, and were conferred on them 
by the Founder of Christianity. It is a long chain 
spanning eighteen centuries of Christian history; but 
when we call for the last link in the chain, and the point 
of support from which the whole is suspended, proof 
not only fails us, but the whole system of ideas is sol- 
emnly contradicted by the whole spirit and aim of 
primitive Christianity. Yet it was by means of these 
very assumptions that Hildebrand brandished his false 
"keys of the kingdom of heaven" over Europe, and 
brought her mightiest monarch to his feet clad in sack- 
cloth. 

It is true that the climax of this series of arrogant 
assumptions was never attained, till the words of the 
Lord Jesus promising to give to Peter the keys of the 
kingdom of heaven were seized upon and interpreted, 
as a grant of power to govern the whole church of God 
with perpetual succession in that high office through all 
coming ages. But a priesthood already in possession 
of such a treasury of the grace of God as baptism and 
the Lord's Supper, would have no difficulty in usurping 
absolute control of the teaching function, and putting 
any interpretation on the words of Jesus which might 
be helpful of their ambitious aims. To the consumma- 
tion of this giant fraud, it was necessary indeed that it 
should be believed that the apostle Peter was actually 
the first bishop of Rome. History was manipulated 
accordingly, and though there is no convincing evidence 
that he ever saw the Imperial City, still less that he ever 
held office in the Church of Rome, yet it early became a 
part of the faith of every good Catholic, that the fisher- 
man of Galilee was the first Roman primate, and trans- 
mitted to every subsequent occupant of the pontifical 
chair those keys of the kingdom of heaven, by the false 
terrors of which popes have overawed Christendom for 



HIERARCHY IN ITS MATURITY. 1 69 

twelve centuries. There is not in human history 
another chapter of superstition, fraud and delusion so 
deeply humiliating, so discreditable to human nature as 
this. And yet but grant that Jesus the Messiah of 
God instituted the rites of baptism and the Lord's 
Supper, and committed them to an exclusive self-per- 
petuating priesthood, to be by them dispensed to all the 
faithful, and every subsequent step in this descending 
series of fraud and delusion becomes so easy and natu- 
ral, that we must almost regard it as a logical necessity. 
Yet the history of the times was in some respects 
exceedingly favorable to its complete development. 
When Constantine came to the imperial throne, and 
made Christianity the religion of the empire, the govern- 
ment of the church became still more centralized in the 
emperor and the Roman primate. When the same 
emperor transferred his court from Rome to Constanti- 
nople, the prestige of more than a thousand years of 
history still clung to Rome, and made her bishop the 
metropolitan of the church universal. The downfall 
of the Western Empire, a little more than a century 
after the deat-h of Constantine, left the bishops of Rome 
free from the restraints of imperial authority, to assert 
a still more unlimited supremacy over all the West, and 
to give to the government of the church in their hands 
the compactness of a vast priestly empire, constructed 
after the model of the fallen imperial power. But the 
source of the power which they now wielded from the 
Danube to the British Isles was still unchangeably the 
same. It was the power of a priesthood which had in 
its keeping the sacred mysteries of Christianity. It 
was a growth from that one root which, we have seen, 
had been planted in the church of the ante-Nicene ages, 
and had attained a vigorous growth so near the cradle 
of Christianity itself. 



170 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

I find the claim asserted in certain quarters, that 
startling and even terrific as the power exercised by 
Pope Gregory VII. seems to us, and much as we should 
deprecate its re-establishment over modern Christendom, 
it was yet, in the circumstances of the times, a benefi- 
cent power necessary for the protection of the church 
against the encroaching tyranny of princes, and that in 
this instance it was wisely and righteously used. Such 
a view of the subject is quite fallacious and delusive. 
It is certainly not necessary to deny that Henry IV., 
Emperor of Germany, was an unprincipled tyrant, and 
that his selling the benefices of the church to the high- 
est bidder was a crime. We may even exult in the fact, 
that the pope used his power however exorbitant and 
dangerous to the social order of the world, in humili- 
ating and restraining a monarch so unscrupulous. We 
may sympathize with the pope, proud and haughty as 
he was, rather than with the emperor degraded and in 
sackcloth for his crimes. But all this has nothing at all 
to do with a just historic estimate of this transaction. 
That the emperor was a tyrant may be very true. But 
it is no less true that the church in those times had so 
divided the sovereignty in Germany and in every other 
country of Europe, and so encroached upon the pre- 
rogatives of all secular sovereigns, as greatly to embar- 
rass all the operations of civil government,- and to 
render the priesthood for the most part independent 
of the secular power. The church was stronger than 
the king, and in consequence of the conflict between 
the two all the evils of anarchy were often produced. 
In the progress of this conflict, civil rulers were under 
the constant necessity of resisting ecclesiastical power, 
to protect themselves and their subjects and all Europe 
against the ever-active encroachments of Rome. 

Both parties in this conflict were ambitious and 



HIERARCHY IN ITS MATURITY. 171 

unscrupulous. In particular emergencies, sometimes 
one was right, sometimes the other ; and it is of little 
consequence to the matter we have before us whether 
the right of the question was with the emperor or the 
pope. The only thing important to be noticed is, that a 
Roman priest had acquired an ascendency over all 
Europe, which constantly threatened the independence 
of sovereigns on their thrones, and brought the very 
existence of civil government into peril ; and that the 
source of that ascendency was the power of the keys, 
the fatal misinterpretation of the promise which Jesus 
made to Peter. It may be possible to adduce many 
instances in which this power was used to accomplish a 
righteous purpose. Any despotic power may sometimes 
be used righteously, despots are not always tyrants. 
But despotism is always as liable and more likely to 
be used tyrannically than righteously, and is always 
destructive of human liberty and happiness ; and no 
despotism is so much to be dreaded as that which is to 
be exercised in the name of God and religion. 

We have a perfect illustration in what is of frequent 
occurrence among ourselves. A riot sometimes takes 
place among laborers of foreign birth, all of whom are 
loyal to the papal church. The excitement is too great 
to be quelled by the efforts of the local police, and very 
serious consequences are threatened. The priest is 
summoned to the scene, — the priest, whose only instru- 
ment of government is the power of the keys, and by its 
magic spell commands the peace and restores order. 
"What a blessed thing," exclaims many a good, easy- 
going Protestant, " is the influence of the priest ! How 
much worse it might have been but for him ! " He 
does not perceive that the same ghostly power which 
was employed in quelling that riot enables the papal 
priesthood to control the whole papal vote at any clec- 



172 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

tion, and cast it for that party which is believed to be 
most unscrupulously subservient to the ambitious de- 
signs of the hierarchy, and that the same power brings 
the liberty and prosperity of a great nation into constant 
peril. It would have been much better that the civil 
power should have maintained its own unquestioned 
supremacy, by exerting any necessary amount of force, 
than that the ghostly power of the priest should have 
been invoked at all. It is necessary to the safety of 
society, that disorderly persons should know, that the 
civil power is able and determined to keep the peace 
without invoking to its aid the ghostly terrors which 
superstition inspires. Universally it is much better, that 
the church should suffer any oppression which the 
secular powers of the earth can inflict upon her than to 
protect herself against it by any such usurpation over 
the consciences of men, as that by which Hildebrand 
terrified Henry IV. and reduced him to a degrading 
submission. 

In this aspect of the case, the same principle may 
perhaps be still better illustrated by the history of the 
conflict between Henry II. of England, and Thomas a 
Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, in the twelfth cen- 
tury. 1 Henry was the most powerful monarch of his 
time, both on account of the extent of his dominions in 
Britain and on the Continent, and on account of his 
eminent talents and consummate policy. Thomas a 
Becket was an Englishman, born in a private station, 
and raised to power in the church and kingdom only by 
his great talents, industry and energy. He first attracted 
the attention of Theobald, Archbishop of Canterbury, 
and was employed by him in very important services. 

1 Hume's Hist. England, Boston edition, Vol. I. pp. 296-326 
inclusive, 343. 



HIERARCHY IN ITS MATURITY. 1 73 

On the accession of Henry to the throne, he made this 
man his chancellor, and in that high office he rose to 
great dignity and splendor ; and on the death of Theo- 
bald, Henry promoted him to be Archbishop of Canter- 
bury. 

From an early period in Henry's reign, he had been 
earnestly seeking to confine the privileges of the clergy, 
who had advanced their pretensions beyond all reason- 
able bounds, within their ancient limits ; and effectually 
to defend the civil against the ambitious encroachments 
of the ecclesiastical power. While Becket filled the 
office of chancellor, he had been perfectly aware of the 
designs of the king, and had co-operated with him in 
promoting them. As soon however as he was seated 
in the arch-episcopal chair, he entirely disregarded the 
plans and wishes of his royal benefactor, and became 
the unscrupulous champion of the clergy, in preserving 
and extending those extravagant pretensions which 
Henry was seeking to restrain within limits not incon- 
sistent with the dignity and independence of the crown. 
This brought the king and the archbishop, and through 
them the civil and ecclesiastical powers, into a fierce 
and disastrous collision, which embittered a large por- 
tion of Henry's reign, and brought his kingdom to the 
very verge of revolution and anarchy. Many years of 
his life were passed in constant fear, lest he himself 
should incur excommunication from the pope, who of 
course sided with the archbishop, and lest his whole king- 
dom should be laid under a papal interdict, depriving 
all his subjects of all the rites and privileges of religion, 
till they should abandon their allegiance to a sovereign 
on whom the terrible anathema of the pope was resting. 
Such an interdict was at that time regarded as more to 
be dreaded than the suspension of the rain and the 
sunshine of heaven. Against such terrors as these the 



174 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

most powerful monarch of the time was only able to 
defend himself and his subjects by the most abject and 
humiliating submission to the pope and his clergy, and 
by doing such penance at the tomb of the archbishop — 
who, in the progress of the conflict, had been assassi- 
nated — as in this age can scarcely be believed to have 
been actually endured by a powerful king of England. 

We can be at no loss as to the source of that terrible 
power which the pope and the clergy were able to exer- 
cise over the life and policy of such a monarch. The 
mysterious power which the pope wielded over all 
Europe in the name of the church and of Jesus Christ, 
more terrible than the imaginary thunderbolts of Jupiter 
were to his ancient worshippers, had its origin only in 
the control of the clerical corporation over the rites of 
baptism and the Lord's Supper, so that that corporation 
could admit to the enjoyment of these rites, and exclude 
from them, at its own discretion. What we witness in 
the twelfth century with so much of horror and disgust 
is only the full maturity of a plant which had already 
taken root and attained to a vigorous growth in the 
church of the second and third centuries. If that seed 
was planted by Jesus himself, or by the apostles acting 
in his name and by his authority, then is Christianity 
responsible for the full-grown hierarchy of the Middle 
Ages with all its terrific powers. 

Undoubtedly the ignorance and superstition of the 
people in the early ages of Christianity facilitated the 
development of this monstrous system. But it must be 
borne in mind, that it was this same ignorance and 
superstition of the people which rendered the incipient 
corruptions of the ante-Nicene age not only possible 
but inevitable. Into no previous age of the world could 
Christianity have been introduced with le"ss liability to 
these same corrupting causes. So far as we can com- 



HIERARCHY IN ITS MATURITY. 1 75 

prebend the force of moral causes, the coming in of 
these corruptions was an incident inseparable from the 
first beginnings of Christianity in the world, and when 
once introduced in whatever manner they must and 
would bear fruit after their kind. Doubtless also the 
decay of the civil powers of the earth after the fall of 
the Western Empire greatly facilitated the aggrandize- 
ment of the priestly corporation that ruled the church. 
But these are not the causes, they are only the favor- 
ing circumstances that assisted the development of 
the cause. Let it be admitted even now that such a 
priestly hierarchy exists by unquestionable divine right, 
and that that clerical hierarchy has the exclusive right 
to dispense baptism and the Lord's Supper to all the 
rest of mankind, and that hierarchy would be rapidly 
and inevitably matured into an ecclesiastical system no 
less arrogant and no less adverse to the liberties of 
mankind than the church of the Middle Ages. The 
bishops, fully assured of their unquestioned power of 
the keys, and that by universal consent they only have 
the gift of qualifying a clergy to administer valid sacra- 
ments, will rapidly work over that clergy to their own 
opinions ; they will magnify more and more the impor- 
tance of valid sacraments to human well-being, and the 
dignity and influence of the clergy which has the exclu- 
sive power of dispensing them to the people ; they will 
have little difficulty in emancipating themselves from 
the lay influences which, owing to the omnipresence of 
dissent on every side, are now an element of consider- 
able weight even in prelatical churches, and the time 
would not be distant when a priestly power no less 
terrific than that of mediaeval Europe would again over- 
shadow Christendom. If men can be made to believe, 
that God has intrusted such a treasury of his grace as 
the Lord's Supper, regarded as a divinely appointed 



176 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

rite which all Christian people are bound to observe, 
to a priestly corporation having perpetual succession, 
then will it also be believed that that same corporation 
is intrusted with the religious teaching of mankind. 
The key that locks up and unlocks that rite will become 
the key of knowledge and opinion also ; and a perma- 
nent body of men intrusted with such control over the 
religious destinies of their fellow-men will become the 
arbiters of their temporal interests -also. The greater 
will still include the less. He that possesses the keys 
of the kingdom of heaven will also possess the keys of 
earthly dominion. The more we reflect on the subject, 
the more profound will be our conviction, that the 
gravest question which yet remains to be decided by 
the authority of the New Testament is, the question 
whether Jesus intended to commit the rite of the Lord's 
Supper to a self-perpetuating corporation, to be by them 
dispensed to all the faithful. Grant that power by 
undisputed right to any priestly hierarchy, and that 
hierarchy will rule the world with a rod of iron. 

All the other elements of the gigantic hierarchy of 
the Middle Ages were developed by a process equally 
natural, from beginnings which have been shown to 
have existed in the church of the second and third 
centuries. We have already seen that even the church 
of those early centuries had adopted a ritualistic wor- 
ship which was quite unknown to the churches of the 
New Testament. By this it is meant that importance 
had begun to be attached to the forms of speech, 
action and dress in which worship was performed, and 
that worship had begun to be conducted by a prescribed 
rubric of which we find no trace in the apostolic rec- 
ords. This could not but be one of the methods in 
which an exclusive hierarchy would magnify its office, 
shroud its functions in a cloud of mystery, and multiply 



HIERARCHY IN ITS MATURITY. 1 77 

the occasions on which its interventions would become 
indispensable. A priestly worship will always be 
ritual, precisely in proportion as it is priestly. The 
growth of the priestly will always be indicated by a 
corresponding growth of the ritual. If we examine the 
cumbrous body of superstition which has overlaid 
the institution of the Supper in the papal church, so as 
scarcely to leave a trace of the original rite, we find the 
beginning of this process of change in the ante-Nicene 
church, and certain to be developed, with the progress 
of priestly usurpation, into the full-grown Mass of the 
Middle Ages and of the present time. 

The same is eminently true of the rite of baptism. 
In the form of baptism which was scrupulously practised 
in the ante-Nicene church, how little there is in common 
with John's baptizing in the river Jordan, or Philip's 
baptism of the eunuch ! l And how evident it is, that in 
the change from the latter to the former, the first step, 
and that a very important step, had been taken towards 
substituting the baptism of the church of the Middle 
Ages for that of the church of the apostles. Verily, 
" the mystery of iniquity did already work." To me I 
confess it is matter of wonder and astonishment, that 
any one can consider the progress of these changes and 
not be shocked at this whole array of holy oil, and holy 
water, and holy vestments, and holy attitudes, and holy 
prescribed forms of speech, from the ante-Nicene church 
to the present time. The growth of ritualism in certain 
modern churches is only a repetition of the very process, 
by which the church of the second and third centuries 
was changed into the church of Hildebrand and Thomas 
a Becket. The only way in which it is possible to 
arrest that morbid growth is not by acts of general 

1 Hip. and his Age, Vol. II. pp. 17, 24. Acts viii: 26-40. 
12 



178 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

convention, or decisions of the court of arches, but 
by exterminating the seeds of evil from which it 
springs. 

It has also been shown, that the church, very early 
after the apostolic times, began to intermeddle with 
marriage and the relations of the sexes otherwise than 
in the interest of pure morals. This element also in 
the ante-Nicene church, like all its other departures 
from the simplicity of the apostles, was sure to bear its 
own proper fruit. Once admit that, though a second 
marriage is not immoral in a layman, it is inconsistent 
with a certain priestly sanctity which should belong to 
the clergy, and such a clergy as was already recognized 
in the early church will be sure to improve upon the 
idea, as a means of more effectually separating them- 
selves from the mass of the faithful, and of impressing 
the people with a higher conception of clerical sanctity. 
It will not be long, till it will begin to be believed that a 
life of celibacy is the proper condition of a clergyman ; 
and that there is religious merit in such a life, and both 
men and women will begin to emulate it as a means of 
commending themselves to the favor of God. 

Such a clergy would also most naturally seek to 
extend its power over the people by usurping control 
over the marriage relations of the laity. Marriage, like 
the Lord's Supper, would become a sacrament, which 
could only be dispensed to the people by the exercise 
of priestly functions ; and in like manner the priesthood 
would easily usurp the regulation of all the relations of 
the sexes, and of the most sacred intimacies of married 
life. Let a clergy of exclusive powers and functions 
begin to meddle with marriage otherwise than in the 
interest of a pure morality, and it will find no stopping- 
place short of the enforced celibacy of the clergy, the 
sanctity of religious vows of perpetual chastity in both 



HIERARCHY IN ITS MATURITY. 1 79 

sexes, and those abominations of the confessional l 
from which no man can remove the veil by describing 
them in plain English, without forfeiting his reputation 
as a pure-minded man. In this respect also the church 
of the second and third centuries is the parent of the 
mediaeval church, and of the papal church of our times. 
Any clergy once placed in the relations in which the 
clergy of that early age stood to the people, so soon as 
it should become a hierarchy in three orders, holding 
the only key to the rites of baptism and the Lord ; s 
Supper, would confine its usurpations over the rights 
and liberties of mankind only by the limits of possibil- 
ity ; and once admit, that a certain impurity is incurred 
by marriage itself, which unfits one for holy functions, 
and for the nearest approach to God which is possible 
for a mortal, and all the usurpations of the papal 
church become an easy possibility. 

In the progress of this revolution, the evil conse- 
quences of this war on nature were a thousand times 
demonstrated by experience. Complaints of the viola- 
tion of chastity on the part of the clergy, notwithstanding 
the most stringent regulations of popes, prelates and 
councils enforcing it, are found in every age, 2 but the 
one only remedy for the evil was either not thought of, 
or was constantly rejected by the hierarchy. The celi- 
bacy of the clergy is a powerful and indispensable 
means of uniting them in a sacred fraternity, separated 
in interest and feeling from the rest of mankind, and of 
rendering them a compact and ready instrument for 
executing the will of the hierarchy in every part of the 
earth. It must therefore be adhered to at whatever 
sacrifice of freedom and virtue. 

1 See Dens' Theology. A more particular reference is neither 
necessary nor desirable. 

a Waddington's Church Mist , Chap. XVI. Sect. 2. 



l8o THE KEYS OF SECT. 

For the same reason such a hierarchy will retain its 
hold as long as possible on all the moralities of private 
life, and on all the intercourse of the sexes in its most 
delicate relations to the happiness of domestic life, and 
the reproduction of the species. This is the maturity 
of the hierarchy. This is the papal church of the Mid- 
dle Ages and of the present time ; and its seeds were 
planted and took root in the church of the two centuries 
which immediately followed the age of the apostles. 

It will be readily admitted, that some of the corrup- 
tions of the mediaeval church cannot be traced back to 
the church of the second and third centuries, though all 
those thus far spoken of certainly can be. One very 
important instrument of power in the papal church is 
the opinion most religiously held by all her members, 
that the intervention of the priest in the hour of death 
is necessary to the safety of the soul, and that priestly 
functions still exercise a controlling influence on its 
happiness after it has left the body. I know not that 
any traces of the doctrines of extreme unction and pur- 
gatory can be found in the ante-Nicene age. They 
seem to have originated at a later period. There was 
indeed one custom of that early age, which seems to 
have been in some degree analogous to extreme unc- 
tion. Baptism was often deferred till just before death, 
under the idea that in that ceremony, all the sins 
one had previously committed are purged away, while 
it has no efficacy in respect to sins committed after, 
wards. If then one received baptism " in articulo 
mortis" he would go into the invisible world in a state 
of entire purity, whatever his previous sins might have 
been. That this is ante-Nicene cannot, I think, be 
denied. That it is apostolic, no sane man will pretend/ 
This doctrine would make priestly functions indispensa- 
ble in a dying hour. 



HIERARCHY IN ITS MATURITY. l8l 

Never have the pretensions of the papacy been 
pushed to an extent so daring and impious, as in 
our own age and under our own eye. It has been 
reserved for our own times to witness the astonishing 
spectacle of an august assembly, professing to repre- 
sent the whole church of God under heaven, declaring 
that the man that sits in the papal chair at Rome, 
and wears the triple crown, is rendered by the grace 
of God infallible in all his official acts. For this 
age also, it has been reserved to witness the humiliating 
spectacle of the foremost man in genius and learning 
of all the English-speaking adherents of the religion of 
Rome, employing his powerful intellect in formulating 
this dogma of papal infallibility into a fundamental 
law of civil and ecclesiastical polity, which is expected 
to regulate all the governments of the world in all com- 
ing ages. Cardinal Archbishop Manning regards the 
church and the state as independent sovereignties, 
each having a pefectly distinct jurisdiction. Of the 
former the pope is made the head by his having suc- 
ceeded to Peter's keys, and is qualified to be the vice- 
gerent of God on earth by the divine gift of infallibility. 
Of the latter, the civil magistrate is the head, with all 
the liabilities to error to which man is subject. As to 
the line which divides the respective jurisdictions of 
these two sovereignties, he holds that certain questions 
are purely secular. These belong entirely to the state. 
Other questions are purely religious. These belong 
entirely to the church, as governed by an infallible 
pope. Other questions still are partly secular and 
partly religious, and therefore belong partly to the 
church and partly to the state ; and as the pope alone 
is endowed with infallibility, it is his exclusive preroga- 
tive to draw the line which limits the jurisdiction of 
each of these sovereignties. According to this system, 



152 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

two distinct sovereignties administered by independent 
human officials of right ought to exist in every nation 
of the earth, — the sovereignty of the state, and the 
sovereignty of the church ; and the infallible pope has 
the God-given prerogative of defining the limits of his 
own jurisdiction, and may claim and exercise just so 
much control over all the interests of society as he 
judges to be right. The bluntest intellect can perceive, 
that this is placing the pope above all the governments 
of the earth, — king of kings and lord of lords. It is 
the system of Hildebrand openly avowed and advocated 
in the nineteenth century and in the vernacular of the 
freest nations of the earth. 

Nor is all this mere empty boast. All Christendom 
has enjoyed the wit of the saying of the great German 
statesman, "We do not purpose to go to Canossa 
again." And yet Pope Pius IX. in the weakness of 
his old age, despoiled of all his temporal dominions, 
and as he claimed a prisoner in the Vatican, was, it 
may be suspected, powerful enough to make the emperor 
of Germany in the midst of his splendid successes 
sometimes feel the truth of the words of the poet, — 

" Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown." 

It often required all the skill, energy and wisdom of 
the foremost statesman of Europe to save Germany 
from being thrown into convulsion and anarchy, by the 
political power of that same Roman priest. The influ- 
ence which Pius IX. was able to exert, not only in 
Germany but throughout Christendom, after he was 
completely divested of secular sovereignty, is the oppro- 
brium of our civilization. Nor was his influence limited 
to the old monarchies of Europe. On this side of the 
Atlantic also, and in every part of our free republic, 
the political influence of the pope awakens grave appre- 



HIERARCHY IN ITS MATURITY. 183 

hension in the mind of every thoughtful patriot. As 
often as our Presidential election occurs, the Roman 
pontiff is able to command hundreds of thousands of 
votes, and to cast them in solid mass for the candidate 
and the party most likely to be the pliant instruments 
of his ambitious purposes. The question from what 
source this wondrous power is derived is interesting, 
not only to the Christian scholar, but to every patriot 
and every statesman. Nor need we go far to seek it. 
The secular power of the pope was never of much 
importance in the political system of Christendom. He 
was never able to inspire any terror by. Caesar's sword. 
It was not that which brought Henry IV. of Germany 
to Canossa. The loss of it is likely to exert no per- 
ceptible influence on his political power. He is still 
believed by many millions to possess the keys of the 
kingdom of heaven, and by these to be invested with a 
power over human well-being no less terrific than the 
power of shutting up the heavens, so that it shall not 
rain on the earth. By these ghostly powers, these in- 
visible terrors which have their seat only in opinion, 
disordered by superstition, the pope makes the thrones 
of kings and emperors to tremble beneath them, and 
governs republics at his will, however loudly they boast 
of their freedom. This power had its origin when the 
rites of baptism and the Lord's Supper were taken 
away from the free use of all the Lord's people, and 
locked up in the keeping of a self-perpetuating priestly 
hierarchy. This was clone before the time of Constan- 
tine, while the church was yet struggling for existence 
with the persecuting power of pagan Rome. 

Historical authorities of the highest respectability 
may be adduced for the opinion that the changes in 
the constitution of the church which were made in the 
second and third centuries, so far from being disastrous 



184 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

to infant Christianity, were necessary and eminently 
beneficial ; that the simple, spiritual fraternity of the 
apostolic age was no more fitted to endure in the dark 
and troublous times upon which the church was so soon 
to be thrown, than the bark canoe of the savage is to 
encounter the storms of mid-ocean ; that it was indis- 
pensable that the church should, as a condition of sur- 
viving the rude shock of the downfall of the empire 
and the decay of civilization, assume an organization 
no less hierarchal, and modes of worship no less ritual 
than those which sprung up in the ante-Nicene ages, 
and develop them into the iron-bound system of the 
Middle Ages. 

At first view this seems plausible, and it is by many 
accepted as profoundly wise. ' But is it really sound ? 
The first thought which it suggests is, that it is by no 
means very creditable to the statesmanlike foresight 
of our Lord, though we should make no account of the 
prophetic prescience with which he was endowed. I 
am averse to saving the reputation of the ante-Nicene 
church, at the expense of the good sense of the founder 
of the church itself. That a being of such marvellous 
insight and foresight as Jesus possessed should found a 
society designed to endure through the ages, and yet 
construct it in such a manner, that it would be 'neces- 
sary in the very next century fundamentally to change 
its constitution, in order to save it from extinction, is 
quite incredible. If this could be proved to be true, it 
would damage his reputation for wisdom and foresight 
through all after times. If this is so, Jesus made a 
fatal mistake in constituting the church ; and the church 
which has come down to us is not his church after all, 
but another, which wiser men than he instituted in place 
of the ephemeral thing which he planned. To the 
superior wisdom of the fathers of the second and third 



HIERARCHY IN ITS MATURITY. 185 

centuries we are indebted for ever having heard the 
name of Jesus, or known anything of his gospel. Cer- 
tainly this view of the subject does little honor to Jesus 
or the apostles. 

Another suggestion no less important is, that if the 
church as Jesus constituted it was not suited to dark 
and stormy times, then it could not have been suited to 
the times in which it was founded ; for that too was 
pre-eminently such an age. If a strong hierarchal gov- 
ernment was ever necessary to the order and safety of 
the church, it would seem that it must have been so in 
that age. The church was very largely composed of 
converts from the lower classes in the cities of the 
empire, rude, ignorant and greatly incapacitated by 
education and habit to appreciate the spiritual doc- 
trines and pure morality of Christianity, and everywhere 
surrounded by adverse opinion and example, and con- 
stantly exposed to a merciless storm of persecution. 
The first century of the Christian era was also a time of 
great civil commotion and violent revolutions, — the 
time of Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, Nero and Domitian. 
The condition of society in the second century was 
much more orderly and tranquil ; it was the age of 
Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian and the Antonines. No his- 
torical reason can be assigned why the constitution 
established by the apostles was less suited to the con- 
dition of society in the second and third centuries, than 
in the first ; and if they failed in adapting it to the 
necessities of after ages, they must have equally failed 
in adapting it to their own. If this view of the case must 
be accepted as sound, then was Jesus' conception of the 
kingdom of heaven only the sickly dream of an enthu- 
siast, as unpractical as the wildest schemes of a modern 
socialist, a conception which would have utterly passed 
away in a century or two, if wiser men than he had not 



l86 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

reconstructed its constitution. This certainly is not my 
estimate of the founder of the Christian church, as 
compared with the fathers of the second and third 
centuries. 

After all, what is the evidence which justifies the 
assertion of these would-be dictators in the department 
of philosophical history, — that the spiritual fraternity 
founded by Jesus and the apostles was unfit to encoun- 
ter the dark and barbarous ages that followed ? Who 
can show that if the men that composed the church 
in the post-apostolic age, and especially the men that 
governed it, had fully appreciated the spiritual nature 
of the Christian brotherhood established by Jesus, 
and adhered to it with unwavering fidelity, it might 
not have stood up as grandly in that age as it did in 
the age of Nero, Titus and Domitian, while the civil 
powers of the earth were shaken to their foundations, 
and Jerusalem itself was overthrown as by a terrible 
earthquake from the Lord ? Such an assertion is not 
only unsustainecl by any sufficient evidence, but the 
considerations which weigh against it are abundant and 
convincing. That an organization which, in the bad 
times of the last ten of the twelve Ccesars, extended 
its peaceful conquests from the Euphrates to the Atlan- 
tic, could not have maintained even its existence in the 
times of Trajan and the Antonines, and the centuries 
that followed, is an assertion easy to make, but hard to 
prove. 

It is obvious indeed, that if Christianity had not 
been shorn of much of its spiritual power by the super- 
stitions and the spiritual despotisms which were early 
incorporated with it, the decay of civilization in the 
ancient world might have been greatly retarded, if not 
effectually arrested, and that the disasters which befell 
society at and after the fall of the empire might have 



HIERARCHY IN ITS MATURITY. 187 

been greatly mitigated, and the total social eclipse of 
the Middle Age prevented. It is impossible for me to 
read the writings of such men as Tertullian and Cyprian 
without the suspicion, that a hierarchy governed by high 
officials of their fiery and imperious spirit must have 
been well fitted to provoke the bitter hostility of their 
pagan neighbors, and a great deal more exposed to 
persecution than such a church as that of the apostles 
would have been in like circumstances. I join with all 
Christian ages in admiring the sublime heroism of the 
men of that early age, in braving all the persecuting 
power of pagan Rome ; but I do not admire the haughty 
and imperious spirit which often appears in their writ- 
ings, and which they seem to have sometimes manifested 
in the discharge of their official functions. It is not an 
agreeable thing to say, but the truth of the case com- 
pels me to say it. I do not wonder that a hierarchy so 
governed, ramified over the whole empire, excited the 
jealousy of the emperors, and exposed the Christians to 
the utmost violence of the persecutor. In a subsequent 
part of this work it will be shown, that an analogous 
constitution of the church in our own times does expose 
it to the distrust and suspicion of the political powers 
of society. The position occupied by the heads of the 
hierarchy in those ages could hardly have been more 
contradictory to the relations which our Lord said his 
followers should maintain to each other than it was. 
" They that would be great among them " did " exer- 
cise dominion over them," and " they that were chief 
among them " did " exercise authority upon them." It 
is hardly credible that a religious society pervading the 
whole empire and so governed could have failed to 
excite the hostility of a secular power so jealous as that 
of Rome, and especially when we remember that that 
secular power was accustomed to absorb into itself all 



165 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

the religious powers of society. The literature of 
Christendom is full of the assumption, that the simple 
church of the apostles could not have sustained itself in 
the dark ages that followed. The assertion is both 
gratuitous and contradictory to evidence. 



THE REFORMATION 1 89 



CHAPTER III. 

THE REFORMATION. 

It would not surprise me to learn, that at this stage 
of our inquiries, I seem to some of my readers to have 
proved much more than I intended, — to have involved 
myself inextricably in the conclusion, that the introduc- 
tion of Christianity into the world was necessarily a 
hopeless failure. I have admitted and maintained, that 
it was impossible, under the well-known and established 
laws of moral causation, that the age to which it was 
introduced should appreciate it or fail to corrupt it ; and 
that the same would have been true if any other age 
had been selected, instead of the one to which it was 
actually introduced. Indeed, if it suited our purpose 
to enter on the inquiry, it would be easy to show, that 
that age was in many important respects providentially 
qualified and fitted for the reception and improvement 
of the gift. If therefore that age failed to appreciate 
it, any other age would still more have failed. 

It has also been shown that the corruptions which 
were introduced immediately after the apostles were 
removed from the scene, were the seeds of all the evils 
that followed, that by a logical necessity they were sure 
to be developed into all the superstitions and spiritual 
despotisms of the mediaeval church, that the church of 
Hildebrand was logically and necessarily the offspring 
of the church of the second and third centuries. Why 



190 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

then was not Christianity hopelessly corrupted ? Why 
was it not buried in the grave of mediaeval supersti- 
tion and spiritual despotism, beyond the possibility of 
any future resurrection ? How was any reformation 
possible ? 

If the considerations which have been insisted on in 
the last two chapters comprised the whole truth of the 
case, this difficulty would be insuperable. In respect 
to any other religion that has ever existed, the objec- 
tion would be unanswerable. Buddhism, for example, 
has seen a brighter age than the present. At least this 
is so if we may trust the results of recent scholarship 
in respect ^to its history. In its early history it was 
purer than it is now. It has been deeply corrupted. 
But it has in itself no reforming power. Its corruptions 
are evidently destined to wax deeper and darker, till it 
is either supplanted by a better system, or perishes with 
the decaying civilization with which it is identified. 
With Christianity it is not so. It has within itself a 
living principle of recuperation and reformation. 

It is exceedingly important to the end I have in view, 
to make it apparent what this reformatory power is ; 
for nothing in Christianity more decisively proves its 
divine origin than this. The living principle that per- 
vades the whole system and gives it indestructible 
vitality is the character, the life, the whole personality 
of its founder, Jesus the Christ. When he dwelt among 
men, never was one in human form so unappreciated* 
as he. We have seen with what difficulty his twelve 
disciples, notwithstanding their intimacy with him, were 
made to understand him. That difficulty was at last 
overcome, and they have left in their records of him a 
true conception of the divine Master, which can never 
perish, " mmnmentum are pej-enniiis." Critics may 
think they have objections to the form in which these. 



THE REFORMATION. 191 

records have come to us. What they may say of that 
matter must always be of very little weight. It will 
still remain true, that the unique and grand conception 
of Jesus the Christ lies embedded in these records, and 
never can be eliminated from them ; and in that concep- 
tion is found the undying power of Christianity. This 
conception the apostles not only embodied in their 
records, but they impressed it in more or less of dis- 
tinctness upon the minds of vast multitudes of men in 
their own generation, and by this means did much to 
render it a vital element of all the future. It might in 
a degree fade out from the minds of men in their suc- 
cessive generations, yet if we consult the records of the 
subsequent ages, we shall be filled with wonder at dis- 
covering how enduring it was in times of so much dark- 
ness and superstition. This is the bright side of the 
ante-Nicene church, and not only of it but of many 
darker and more corrupt ages that followed. On this 
side of the picture the mind of the Christian scholar 
may dwell with grateful exultation. 

If however the influence of this conception had been 
left entirely to such personal transmission from age to 
age, it must have gradually faded out, and disappeared 
in the darkness of ignorance and superstition. It was 
not however and could not be so left. There was one 
cause which insured for it permanent and ever-increas- 
ing power. The church might b£ corrupted, and the 
hierarchy despotic ; but they could not be wholly un- 
mindful of the foundation upon which they must always 
rest. That foundation never could be any other than 
the records which the apostles had left of Jesus and the 
resurrection. These therefore would be sacredly pre- 
served. They might be shut out from the minds of the 
people by their inability to read them, and by the 
despotism of the hierarchy. But the priesthood could 



192 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

not fail to recognize them as the original source of their 
power, and cherish them accordingly. Perhaps this is 
the principal reason why the learning of the ancient 
world was chiefly preserved in churches and monasteries. 
Even in the darkest times, there were many among the 
priests and monks who were acquainted with the New 
Testament in the Latin language, and it must always 
have exerted a powerful influence in preserving and 
transmitting from age to age some knowledge of Jesus 
Christ. With the revival of learning the Greek Testa- 
ment was restored to Western Europe, and very widely 
attracted the attention of studious and learned men in 
all the universities and monasteries. The hierarchy 
might insist on its exclusive right to interpret the Bible, 
but as the eager and enthusiastic scholars of those ages 
studied these original records of Christianity, no author- 
itative interpretation could obliterate or obscure that 
original conception of the gospel which is imperishably 
embedded in those records. A knowledge of the gen- 
uine gospel of Christ was thus constantly increasing in 
obscure places, of which the leaders of the hierarchy 
had no suspicion. Light was springing up in the midst 
of darkness, and life in the midst of death. 

The proof is overwhelming, that Jesus and his apos- 
tles were neither the selfish impostors nor the half- 
crazed enthusiasts they are represented to have been 
by the modern rejectors of supernatural Christianity. 
If they had been such, there could have been no such 
reformatory power still living in the very heart of the 
church, to recover and restore it to its original purity 
and power. The fact that there is in it such a power 
is decisive proof that these were the most truthful of 
men. None but true men could ever have represented 
to the world through eighteen centuries that conception 
of Jesus Christ the Son of God, which was the vital 



THE REFORMATION. 1 93 

force of the Reformation. If Jesus had not been the 
Christ, the apostles could never have made a represen- 
tation of him which should have exerted such a power 
in the midst of surrounding darkness, and after so many 
dark and stormy ages. The hierarchy could make 
kings tremble on their thrones, but it could not arrest 
this silent influence of the gospel over the minds and 
hearts of men in the very bosom of the church, steadily 
preparing the way for that mighty upheaval in the moral 
and spiritual world, which is known as the Reformation. 
I have admitted and maintained that the early and long 
corruption of the church was inevitable. These con- 
siderations show, that in the fulness of time its reforma- 
tion was no less inevitable. 

For centuries before the occurrence of this great 
event, the indications of such an approaching revolution 
were manifest in many different countries of Europe. 
Of these the teachings and career of "WiCidyffe in Eng- 
land, and of Huss in Bohemia, are among the most 
conspicuous. A longing for a purer gospel had exten- 
sively taken possession of the minds of men, and could 
only be repressed by the exertion oi the utmost perse- 
cuting violence of the hierarchy, Ic was only by such 
repressive measures as those of the council of Constance, 
holding its sessions from 1414 to 141S, condemning and 
anathematizing the doctrines of Wicklvffe, and ordering 
his bones to be taken from consecrated ground and 
cast upon a dunghill, and condemning John Huss and 
Jerome of Prague to the flames for their alleged here- 
sies, that the deep and widely prevalent discontent was 
for the present repressed. The doctrines and the prac- 
tices of the hierarchy were judged and condemned by 
many of the most enlightened men of the age, by a 
standard which the hierarchy could neither understand 
nor abrogate. They were tried before & court which 

*3 



194 THE KEYS OF SECT 

had no earthly locality and no human representative, 
and which was to the powers which seemed to govern 
the world utterly invisible and intangible ; yet it was 
soon to prove as irresistible as the lightnings of heaven. 
It was that judgment of the twelve apostles which Jesus 
had foretold when he promised that they should "sit 
on twelve thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel." 
Fourteen centuries had passed away, but that prom- 
ise of the man Christ Jesus was still being mightily 
fulfilled. 

What then was the Reformation ? What was the 
aim and purpose of the heroic men who attempted and 
achieved it ? What were the results which it accom- 
plished? Accurately to answer these questions is of 
great importance to the purpose I have in hand. Wil- 
son, in his "Outlines of History," much used as a text- 
book in our schools and colleges, says, ' " The true causes 
of the Reformation are to be sought for in that under- 
current of social progress in which the human mind had 
long been laboring to accomplish its freedom." No 
conception of the subject could be more fatally errone- 
ous. When liberty is sought as an end, it is seldom or 
never won. Had Luther and his co-reformers attacked 
the hierarchy in the name of liberty, had they simply 
demanded such changes in the constitution of the church 
and the hierarchy, as would have afforded necessary 
guarantees of freedom of thought and speech, nothing 
can be more certain than their utter and ignominious 
failure. They could not in that way have displaced the 
smallest stone in the vast ecclesiastical structure of the 
ages. Their attention was fixed on nothing of the sort. 
At the outset Luther and his friends had no quarrel 
with the organization of the church, and no thought of 

1 Wilson's Outlines, p. 788. 



THE REFORMATION. 



95 



assailing it in any particular. The organic changes 
which the Reformation produced were entirely second- 
ary. They were accepted as necessary, not sought for 
as originally desirable. Most of the reformers clung 
with tenacious affection to the idea of an oecumenical 
organization of the church, and relinquished it, when 
necessity compelled, with deep regret. In the beginning 
Luther had no quarrel with the supremacy of the pope ; 
and when at last he found the reigning pope irreconcil- 
ably hostile to his opinions, he proposed to appeal the 
matters in question to a general council, and that after 
the experience of the council at Constance, and the 
melancholy fate of John Huss and Jerome of Prague. 
He still cherished the fond hope, that he might yet avoid 
the sad necessity, as he regarded it, of a breach with 
the papal church. There may have been single excep- 
tions to this, but such certainly was the general spirit 
and aim of the reformers. 

The real aim of the reformers was to restore to the 
church, and proclaim afresh to the world, that gospel of 
Christ by which Christianity won its original victories, 
and acquired its influence in the world. The reformers 
had their own favorite forms of stating Christian doc- 
trine, and they were not entirely agreed in them among 
themselves. They did not always see doctrinal ques- 
tions in clear, unrefracted, uncolored light. Their modes 
of statement were variously modified by the speculative 
controversies which had amused and agitated men's 
minds through many preceding ages. But their object 
was one and simple. It was to restore to the church 
and the monastery the primitive gospel of Christ, and 
to use it as of old for the healing of the nations. It is 
often asserted, and I therefore suppose believed, by 
good men, that the papal church is orthodox. In a 
certain modified sense this may be true. Most or all 



196 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

the essential doctrines of the gospel may perhaps be 
found in her recognized formularies. But she has clone 
precisely that which our Lord charged the scribes and 
Pharisees with doing. She has made void the com- 
mandment of God by her tradition. She has so' over- 
laid the whole gospel of Christ by her superstitious 
traditions, that it is to the great mass of men as much 
out of sight and knowledge as though it had never 
existed. 

Let us illustrate this by an example. The immediate 
occasion of Luther's rupture with the Church of Rome 
was his controversy with Tetzel, in reference to the sale 
of indulgences. And what were indulgences ? The 
pope as head of the church, and as having succeeded 
to Peter's keys of the kingdom of heaven, claimed to 
exercise over all Christendom the power to absolve men 
from their sins, and to open to them the treasures of 
God's grace, or to hold them fast in the bonds of their 
iniquity, and to shut the kingdom of heaven against 
them. Leo X. then filled the papal chair. He was a 
pontiff of magnificent designs, and needed enormous 
sums of money to carry into execution his vast enter- 
prises, especially for the erection of the church of St. 
Peter's at Rome, his prodigal patronage of art and 
learning, and to sustain the expenses of a war with the 
Turks. One of the methods which he adopted was, to 
send agents through all Europe, offering to sell in open 
market and at stipulated prices, remission of the penal- 
ties which men had incurred by their sins, whether 
.those penalties were temporal or eternal; and not only 
for sins already committed, but for those which they 
were now committing, and even for those which they 
desired or intended to commit in the future. Of this 
traffic Tetzel was the principal agent in Germany. 
Luther's soul was filled with indignation at this infa- 



THE REFORMATION. 197 

mous traffic. Of what avail was it that the church still 
held to the doctrine of the remission of sins through the 
death of Christ on the cross, if any sinner could obtain 
from the agents of the pope a complete remission of the 
penalty due to his sins, for a pecuniary consideration ? l 
The doctrine of the forgiveness of sins through the 
cross of Christ was utterly nullified. 

Or take another example. In the Douay Bible, the 
only English version of the Bible, the use of which the 
papal church allows to its members, the Greek word 
psiavosG) (repent) is uniformly translated, "do penance." 
Every one understands that to do penance means, that 
on confession of one's sins to the priest, he shall com- 
ply with the conditions of absolution which the priest 
imposes. Of what avail is it then that the formularies 
of the papal church contain the doctrine of repentance ? 
In impression upon the great mass of mankind, she 
renders that doctrine utterly void by her traditions. 
Repentance means, confess your sins to the priest and 
receive forgiveness from him on such conditions as he 
imposes. These examples precisely illustrate the con- 
dition in which Luther and his co-reformers found the 
doctrine of Christ in the papal church. Recognized it 
might be in the dead and forgotten formularies of the 
church, but rendered utterly void by masses of super- 
stitious tradition accumulated through the ages, and 
constantly enforced by immemorial custom, and the 
authoritative teachings of the priesthood. There was 
therefore a necessity that the reformers should purify 
the house of God, as the reforming kings of Israel did, 
an # d bring forth from the midst of this rubbish, under 
which it seemed hopelessly buried, the primitive gospel 



1 Mosheim's Church History, Hist, of Reformation, Chap. II., 
Sects. 7 and 9. 



I9S THE KEYS OF SECT. 

of Christ, and with primitive freedom of utterance pro- 
claim it to the world. 

This was what Luther attempted to do when with 
burning indignation he exposed the infamous teachings 
and practices of Tetzel. He aimed at religious truth. 
He and his friends sought a pure gospel, not mere 
liberty. When he attacked Tetzel, he had no thought 
of assailing the hierarchy or the supremacy of the 
Roman pontiff. If it is true, that the efforts of the 
reformers did result in a vast enlargement of the free- 
dom of the human mind, and in the emancipation of a 
large portion of the Christian people of Germany and 
in several other European nations, from the supremacy 
of the pope and the domination of the papal hierarchy. 
In Germany, Switzerland, Holland, Sweden, England 
and Scotland, it led to the organization of national 
churches, all entirely independent of the papal hie- 
rarchy, and of each other, and in the rejection of im- 
mense masses of superstition which the priesthood 
had invented through so many ages. But these changes 
were all secondary, not primary. They were not origi- 
nally aimed at or contemplated. The reformers sought 
religious truth as they had learned it from the New 
Testament. The papal hierarchy denied them the 
boon they sought, and attempted to repress their long- 
ings by the strong hand of power. They saw religious 
truth with such clearness and desired it with such fervor, 
as made them bold to resist the power that denied 
them the boon, however sacred they had hitherto re- 
garded it, and to obey God rather than man though 
claiming to hold the keys of the kingdom of heaven. 
The more they contended for the simple gospel of 
Christ against the high pretensions of the papacy, the 
more they were led to discover the baselessness and 
arrogance of those pretensions, and made strong to 



THE REFORMATION. 199 

break off all connection with a so-called church so 
fatally corrupted. Thus, their efforts to obtain and 
enjoy a pure gospel revealed to them the terrible des- 
potism under which they were living, and their need of 
emancipation, in order that without molestation they 
might serve God in the gospel of his Son. In this, as 
in so many other instances of the history of the world, 
an honest effort to obey God brought men out of bond- 
age into the enjoyment of comparative liberty. 

It follows from this view of the aims of the reformers, 
that they were likely to pursue their inquiries, in respect 
to the organization and government of the church, no 
further than was found to be necessary for the attain- 
ment of the great end they had in view. The object 
they were in pursuit of was Christian truth, not 
church polity. It was a pure gospel, not theories and 
limitations of church power. Nothing can be more 
creditable to the honest, devout integrity of the re- 
formers than the fact, that their quarrel with the papacy 
was a contention for truth and righteousness before 
God, and not a question of mere church power. Of 
course I am aware that these remarks are not applica- 
ble to certain aspects of the English Reformation. So 
far as respects the relation of the English crown to the 
church, the question is a very different one, and will be 
duly considered in another place. It is enough for my 
present purpose, that in respect to the leaders of the 
Reformation in Germany and Switzerland, what has 
just been stated cannot be gainsaid. Church polity 
was secondary, and was pursued no further than was 
thought to be necessary to protect themselves in the 
enjoyment of a pure gospel. It was a conflict for truth, 
and not for power. 

All the churches which were separated from the 
papacy at the Reformation relinquished entirely for the 



200 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

time being the idea and the hope of a universal organic 
church. Such a conception was to them impossible to 
be realized. They did not abandon it, because they 
had ceased to love and cherish the conception, but 
because it had become utterly impracticable. In one 
respect the influence of the Reformation was strikingly 
analogous to that of the overthrow of the western 
Roman Empire. The empire had grown up to the 
vast magnitude which it attained in the times of Trajan 
and the Antonines, by uniting a great number of dis- 
tinct independent municipalities into one great national 
whole, by irresistible Roman conquest. United by con- 
quest, held together by irresistible imperial power, and 
compacted by the vigorous administration of Roman 
law, they presented for the time being something of the 
spectacle of one great homogeneous nationalty. But 
as soon as the imperial bond that bound them together 
was dissolved, they had no power at all to reconstruct 
a centralizing power, and thus retain their national 
unity ; but returned again to that condition of inde- 
pendent municipalities and states, in which they had 
existed before the Rpman conquest. 

The growth of the papal church was in some respects 
very analogous to the growth of the empire. It has 
been shown, and indeed is admitted by the ripest 
scholars of the most diverse schools of thought, that all 
the primitive churches were independent local societies, 
and that in that process of centralization .and consolida- 
tion which was commenced soon after the end of the 
apostolic age, they were first combined under a growing 
prelatical influence into provincial and national com- 
munities, (using the term "national " of course in that 
restricted sense in which alone it could be employed, 
while the imperial power of Rome remained,) and that 
even in the second and third centuries this centraliza- 



THE REFORMATION. 201 

tion was to such an extent an accomplished fact, that 
that each nation or province had a recognized metro- 
politan primate. The churches had ceased to be, as in 
apostolic times, independent local communities. These 
had been absorbed into provincial or national churches. 
Then came the primacy of the bishop of Rome over 
them all. Vast, centralized, imperial power was a 
divinity which in those ages the world worshipped. Men 
made haste to construct the church after the same 
model which in the state had so long inspired awe and 
admiration. When the empire fell, and men saw with 
sickness of heart, that all that was magnificent in uni- 
versal imperial power had irrecoverably perished, they 
eagerly sought to realize the same grand conception, in 
a church universal under the headship of the bishop of 
Rome. 

For a thousand years, all the power and craft and 
statesmanship of the hierarchy were employed in con- 
solidating by the forces which superstition supplies, the 
national and provincial churches of the early ages into 
a compact, universal church governed by the bishop of 
Rome, just as Roman legions had been employed in 
consolidating independent municipalities and states 
into the mighty structure of imperial Rome. When by 
the Reformation all the churches which had adopted 
the reformed ideas were forced to break the papal yoke 
from their necks, they were just as powerless to con- 
struct any new central power to unite them into a 
church universal, as the nations and municipalities 
which were united under the Roman Empire were, to 
retain their common nationality after the imperial tie 
had been dissolved. They returned by the necessity 
of the case to that condition of national churches, 
which had existed before the ghostly conquests of the 
bishop of Rome had been achieved. The reformers of 



2 02 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

that time had not discovered, that the conception of a 
universal church organization, controlled and governed 
by human officials, is contrary to the spirit of Chris- 
tianity, and contradictory of our Lord's solemn words, 
" My kingdom is not of this world. " They abandoned 
it with no small sickness of heart, not from any convic- 
tion of its badness, but from inevitable necessity. In 
the literature of the times there are many expressions 
of regret of the separation of the reformed churches 
from each other, and of longing for some closer bond 
of union among them, and many efforts to accomplish 
what seemed to them so desirable. 

The reason is therefore entirely obvious, why all the 
reformed churches retained their national church gov- 
ernments. There was no thought at that time of re- 
turning to the local independence which prevailed in 
the apostolic age. They would gladly have retained 
the oecumenical organization if they could ; but as this 
was impossible, they eagerly clung to that national 
organic unity which was still in their power. Previous 
to the Reformation all these churches had been united 
under the headship of Rome. This tie was now broken, 
and that national unity with which they were under the 
necessity of contenting themselves, rendered a national 
headship also necessary. The clergy, accustomed to 
the headship of Rome, and not to national autonomy, 
more naturally looked to a head outside of their own 
body, and hesitated to take the government of the 
church into their own hands. It was a function they 
had never become accustomed to perform. On the 
other hand, the governments of Europe at that time 
had become for the most part absolute monarchies. 
Almost the only limitation of the power of the kings 
was the control which the pope exercised over the 
ecclesiastical affairs of the nations. From this control 



THE REFORMATION. 203 

the Reformation liberated them, and they eagerly un- 
dertook to exercise such an oversight of the national 
churches as had now become a universally felt necessity, 
and the kings became supreme in ecclesiastical as well 
as in civil affairs. To a considerable extent the powers 
which the Roman Caesar had lost, the secular, national 
Caesar acquired. 

Thus came into being the church and state system 
of Protestant Europe. The reformers keenly felt the 
necessity of lodging somewhere those powers which the 
state exercised over their churches. The birth of abso- 
lute religious freedom was not yet. It was a result 
which must sooner or later spring from the Reformation, 
but its time had not yet come. The reformers could 
not conceive of it. They could not understand that 
Christianity could prosper without a strongly organized 
and governed church, or without the presence of a 
strong and vigorous hand, ready at all times to repress 
dissent, and enforce uniformity of faith and worship. 
It was a bad lesson which had penetrated the very soul 
of all Christendom, enforced by all the usages and pre- 
cedents of a thousand years of spiritual despotism. It 
could only be unlearned by generations of providential 
teaching, under the influence of the doctrines of the 
Reformation. If Luther and Calvin and their associates 
could have foreseen, that from the Reformation there 
would ultimately result such a condition of absolute 
religious freedom as that which now exists in this coun- 
try, with all the consequences of sectarian conflict, 
rivalry, weakness and anarchy which we experience 
from it, they would have been utterly appalled at the 
prospect, and I know not but the fear of it would have 
driven them back with haste into the bosom of the papal 
church. They could not foresee what we, if we are wise, 
have learned by experience, — that absolute religious 



204 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

liberty even with all these evils is infinitely preferable 
to the exercise of any restraint whatever upon iaith, 
worship and conscience. Even Richard Baxter, a cen- 
tury and a half later than these times, with all the 
devoutness and amiableness of his character, would 
have endured martyrdom rather than renounce his 
faith in the duty of the civil magistrate to enforce 
the unity and purity of the national church by appro- 
priate laws and penalties. No proposition could have 
been made to the leaders of the Reformation in the 
sixteenth century, which would have seemed to them 
more unworthy of a moment's consideration, than to 
open all the flood-gates of dissent, by establishing abso- 
lute religious liberty. It would have seemed to them 
just as absurd, as to constitute the state without any 
civil head having the power to compel submission and 
obedience. If any one will not recognize this, as the 
standpoint from which the reformers almost necessarily 
regarded this whole subject, he can do them no justice. 
In the construction of these national churches, so far 
as the principles and usages of the papal church had 
been seen to be superstitious and unscriptural, they were 
rejected. Otherwise they were of course retained. 
There was in this respect in the national churches of 
different countries great diversity, according to the 
wisdom and insight of the men who in the several 
countries led the movement, the peculiar circumstances 
of each country, and perhaps still more the taste, 
whims and caprices of the ruling sovereigns. In some 
countries, in England, for example, the episcopate was 
retained with little modification. In others it was re- 
tained in only a very modified form. In other countries 
still, it was entirely rejected, and the doctrine of the 
parity of the clergy 'was avowed. A similar disparity 
existed in respect to the rites, ceremonies and liturgy 



THE REFORMATION. 205 

of the papal church. Some rejected them altogether. 
Others retained them in greater or less degree, accord- 
ing to the tastes of the leading reformers in each coun- 
try, and of the men in civil power. There was there- 
fore very great diversity in the constitution and forms 
of worship of the several national reformed churches, 
and it will be seen as we proceed that, though this 
diversity seemed of little importance at the time, it 
was to exert no small influence on the future of Prot- 
estantism. 

In the midst of all this diversity, there were two ques- 
tions, the importance of which has been made apparent 
in the previous chapters of this volume, in respect to 
which the reformed churches were perfectly unanimous. 
They all regarded a clergy qualified for their sacred 
functions by the laying on of hands, as essential to the 
very existence of the church. If in the discussions of 
the times this was seriously called in question, I am 
not aware of it ; or if it was sometimes called in ques- 
tion in the half-crazed theories of enthusiasts, the doubt 
was never regarded by the leading reformers as worthy 
of any consideration. Like the national organization 
of the church, it was accepted as a matter of necessity, 
neither requiring nor admitting of argument. There 
was nothing in the circumstances of the times to raise 
any question about it, or to call for any reinvestigation 
of it. The doctrine had come down unquestioned from 
the remote Christian antiquity of the second and third 
centuries, and there was nothing to suggest to the men' 
of that age, that there was any occasion to call it in 
question. 

Equally unanimous were the reformers in their un- 
doubting belief that baptism and the Lord's Supper 
were only to be exhibited to the people as sacraments 
administered by a clergy, exclusively qualified for the 



2 06 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

performance of that function by the laying on of hands. 
There was not one of the reformed churches which did 
not retain, in some form, the power of the keys. In 
every one of them some clerical or ecclesiastical guar- 
dianship of baptism and the Lord's Supper, some 
churchly power to admit to them and exclude from 
them, to open and to shut the door of the kingdom of 
heaven, was retained with scrupulous care. This view 
of the case was unanimously retained in the reformed 
churches, not because the question had been thoroughly 
examined and all had come to the same conclusion, but 
because the circumstances of the times had never raised 
the question. The power of the keys was retained just 
as the national organization of the church was retained, 
as a matter of necessity and of course, the contrary of 
which was not to be thought of. 

The Preformation left three questions precisely where 
it found them : viz., the national centralization of the 
church instead of local independency, a clergy exclu- 
sively qualified for certain sacred functions by the laying 
on of hands, and a corporate guardianship of baptism 
and the Lord's Supper, invested with authority to admit 
to them and exclude from them. It is certainly very 
well worthy of the consideration of the reader, that it 
has been, I think, already conclusively shown, that each 
of these three doctrines was firmly rooted in the church 
of the second and third centuries, and was a germ from 
which the mediaeval church grew. It was also shown 
with equal clearness, that each of them is a doctrine in 
respect to which the ante-Nicene church stood in clear 
and strong contrast with the church of the apostles. 
There is no trace of them in the apostolic records. 
They owed their origin to the corrupted Judaism and 
the paganism from which the church in that early age 
received such vast accessions of numbers. We have 



THE REFORMATION. 207 

seen what that influence was on the growth and matu^ 
rity of the papacy. We are yet to see in the progress 
of this work, what their influence has been on Protes- 
tantism in the first three centuries and a half of its 
history. If to the three elements of the ante-Nicene 
church just enumerated as unanimously retained by the 
Protestant churches, we add a fourth which was retained 
by one of the Protestant national organizations, and 
that one perhaps, all things considered, the most influ- 
ential of them all, — the hierarchal organization of the 
clergy in three orders, — we shall have in our hand the 
key to the history of Protestantism from the Reforma- 
tion to the present time, and to its present strangely 
anomalous condition. To apply that key to the solu- 
tion of the problems which are presented by the past 
history of Protestantism, and in its present aspects, is 
the task I hope to accomplish in the remaining portion 
of this volume. I also indulge the cheerful hope that 
the use of that key will open before us a clear path to a 
church of the future in glorious contrast in all things to 
the church of Hildebrand and the papacy, and as much 
brighter and better than the church of that transition 
period through which we have been passing since the 
Reformation, as the entrance of Israel into the promised 
land was better than his long wanderings in the great 
and terrible wilderness. No man regards the Reforma- 
tion with more grateful exultation and admiring rever- 
ence than I do. In it were the seeds of all that is 
bright and precious in the coming destinies of the 
church of God. But it is to be regarded not as the 
completed, but only as the begun Reformation from the 
great apostasy. There yet remaineth much old leaven 
to be purged away. In some very important respects 
the church of the Reformation bears the lineaments of 
its papal mother. It must reject them all, and be- 



2o8 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

come again the church of the apostles and of Jesus 
Christ. V 

The reader must not understand me to maintain in 
this chapter, that the reformers retained that extreme 
interpretation of the power of the keys, which was and 
is still held in the papal church, — that the church has 
power over the future and eternal destiny of the soul. 
This is utterly at variance with the doctrines of Protes- 
tantism. But if our Lord requires all his followers to 
observe the Christian rites, and has given to the church 
in its corporate capacity the power to exclude from 
participation in them, that is a mighty instrument of 
government, and must greatly modify the constitution 
of all forms of the church that retain it. In this form 
the reformed churches did retain it, as a fundamental 
principle in their constitutions. It gives character to 
all Protestant church government. 



RELIGIOUS LIBERTY. 209 



CHAPTER IV. 

RELIGIOUS LIBERTY. 

In using this phrase, it is necessary to see to it that 
we employ it with exactness and precision. Many 
discussions are fatally vitiated by the vague and indefi- 
nite use of it. When I affirm, that religious liberty is a 
universal human right, I mean to affirm, that each 
individual hum^n being is surrounded by a sphere of 
moral and spiritual relations, within which he owes 
allegiance directly to God ; and that within that sphere 
no human power may rightfully restrain his thought, 
his will, his action. In the beginnings of infancy, this 
sphere of individual personality is not yet developed. 
The infant gradually comes into it by his progress in 
personal consciousness, in knowledge, in sense of moral 
obligation, and in individual will. With this progress 
in personal development, the right of the parent to 
control within this sphere of individuality gradually 
fades out and disappears. There are many cases in- 
deed, in which the development of individuality is at 
maturity so imperfect, that the being has little con- 
sciousness of power to decide independently and for 
himself the grave questions on which his destiny 
depends. He is greatly conscious of the necessity of 
relying on the guiding influence of minds stronger than 
his own. But there is one prerogative of which even 
these feeble minds cannot be deprived. They have a 



2IO THE KEYS OF SECT. 

right, and are bound by the necessity of the case to 
elect for themselves the minds by which they will be 
guided, and this prerogative cannot be rightfully taken 
from them. 

It is important in this place to guard against a com- 
mon misunderstanding. Some men grievously complain, 
that their religious liberty is infringed, if at any time 
they suffer any loss of moral reputation in consequence 
of their holding or rejecting any religious opinions 
whatever. They seriously set up the claim, that if one's 
life is only right, he forfeits nothing of his claim to the 
respect and confidence of the Christian community by 
the rejection and denial of any doctrine of religion, 
however fundamental and sacred. This is not the doc- 
trine of religious liberty which is advocated in these 
pages. In civil affairs, we justly abhor the man who 
advocates opinions which are subversive of all social 
order. We regard the teaching of such doctrines as 
inconsistent with good morals. In like manner, if I 
accept the Christian religion as the hope and salvation 
of the human race, I must regard with strong moral 
disapprobation the man that rejects it, and seeks to 
destroy its influence in the world. By entertaining and 
openly manifesting such disapprobation, I commit no 
violation of his rights, and am guilty of no infringement 
of his liberty. Freedom of thought is sacred, but under 
the government of God there is no such thing as free- 
dom either of thought or action, with exemption from 
moral responsibility for its use. We all intuitively 
recognize such a responsibility in our estimates of each 
other. We all perceive indeed that we have no right 
to call men to account for the use they make of the 
power of thought, and that that is the prerogative of 
God alone. But in our own estimate of each other, we 
cannot avoid anticipating that judgment of God. To 



RELIGIOUS LIBERTY. 2 11 

do so is no violation of the rights of conscience. Such 
a violation only exists when we attempt to control a 
man's opinions .by standing between him and God, and 
for opinion's sake excluding him from privileges which 
God has given him. The church of Christ was not 
designed to be so constituted that, in the discharge of 
its legitimate functions it could ever for a moment 
intrude within the sacred sphere of the soul's direct 
allegiance to God. If God has summoned the whole 
world to faith in Christ, and required all believers* 
devoutly to observe the Lord's Supper, then the observ- 
ance of it lies within that sacred sphere, and the church 
cannot claim to hold the key to that rite without usurp- 
ing authority over individual conscience. The gospel 
cannot be rejected without sin ■ but for that sin the 
culprit must give account to God, and not to the church, 
or to any human tribunal. This is religious liberty. 

Within this sacred sphere of obligation and con- 
science the doctrine of Christianity is, that no human 
authority can intrude. It is a sphere absolutely sacred, 
within which the individual soul meets God alone. It 
matters not under what pretence any other human will 
intrudes within it. If it is the civil ruler, he becomes 
by the very act of intrusion a usurper of the prerogative 
of God. If another human will intrudes within this 
sphere under pretence of ecclesiastical authority, we 
may know that the pretence is a sham and a lie. It 
has already been shown in a former part of this work 1 
with what jealous care the individual allegiance of every 
man to God was guarded in the constitution of the 
Mosaic economy and priesthood. It was also shown 
that in every successive step in the manifestation of the 
Messiah to the world, this same direct allegiance of 

1 Chan. IT, Part I. 



212 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

every man to God was assumed and recognized. The 
Messianic kingdom is built upon it. It was also shown, 
that if the rites of baptism and the Lord's Supper had 
been committed by Jesus Christ to a self-perpetuating 
priestly corporation, to be by them alone dispensed to 
the faithful in all ages, it would have been an arrange- 
ment fatally subversive of this fundamental doctrine of 
the religion of the Bible. 

It has also been shown, that, in the church of the 
second and third centuries, those rites were thus com- 
mitted to a priestly corporation organized into a hier- 
archy of three orders. 1 It was also subsequently 
shown, 2 that from this germ grew the mighty structure 
of the mediaeval church. Nothing can be more absolute 
than the negation and annihilation of this doctrine of 
religious liberty in the church of Hildebrand, and that 
of Leo X., against which Luther and his associates pro- 
claimed their solemn protest. It is equally denied and 
annihilated in the church of Leo XIII. and Cardinal 
Archbishop Manning. According to the doctrines of 
that church, every man does indeed owe direct moral 
and religious allegiance to God, and not to the civil 
state ; but that allegiance is clue to God only through 
the pope and the papal hierarchy. No sacred sphere 
surrounds any human soul, within which that hierarchy 
is not authorized to interfere in the name and with the 
authority of God, and demand submission in respect to 
every item of judgment, worship, conscience and action. 
According to that system, God has so constituted cer- 
tain men in certain official positions his earthly vice- 
gerents, that no man can render allegiance to God 
except through these human representatives. Over all 
humanity they are lords of conscience. Precisely to 

i Chap. VII. 2 Chap. VIII. 



RELIGIOUS LIBERTY. 213 

this extent has the papal church in all ages stood in 
open, impious defiance of the fundamental principles of 
the Bible, both under the old dispensation and the new. 

Against this impious usurpation of the authority of 
God over the soul of man, the Reformation placed 
itself in the attitude of stern and solemn rebuke. The 
whole movement is one solemn assertion of direct alle- 
giance to God, in defiance of all the arrogant claims of 
pope and hierarchy. There can perhaps be no better 
illustration and proof of this than the conduct and 
words of the master spirit of that great revolution 
before the Diet of Worms. " When confronted with the 
brilliant assembly of the emperor, the princes and 
nobles of the empire, the dignitaries of the church, and 
an immense concourse of spectators, and called upon 
to recant, he boldly defended his doctrines, and made 
the memorable declaration : Unless I shall be refuted 
and convinced by testimonies of the Holy Scriptures, 
or by public, clear, and evident arguments and reasons, 
I cannot and will not retract anything, since I believe 
neither the pope nor the councils alone, both of them 
having evidently often erred and contradicted them- 
selves, and since it is neither safe nor advisable to do 
anything against the conscience. Here I stand, I can- 
not otherwise ; God help me ! Amen." 

There can be no difficulty in understanding the atti- 
tude of Luther on this momentous occasion. He had 
a clear and vivid intuition of the fundamental truth, 
that his moral and religious allegiance was due directly 
to God, without the intervention of any human repre- 
sentative. That profoundest conviction of his soul he 
avowed in presence of the emperor and the Diet, as his 
sufficient justification for refusing to submit the points 
at issue to the pope or to any earthly tribunal. It was 
an affair of conscienc and therefore lay directly be- 



214 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

tween him and God. This intuition of personal relig- 
ious liberty was the one consideration by which he and 
his associates justified the insurrection they were raising 
against that established authority of the church, which 
had stood almost unquestioned for several hundred 
years. By the same consideration they justified to 
themselves and to the world the act of separating the 
Christian people of many different countries from all 
connection with the papal church, and organizing the' 
churches of the Reformation. Every one of those 
churches by its organic act practically avowed that very 
doctrine of religious liberty which Luther so eloquently 
asserted for himself before the Diet of Worms. Proba- 
bly no one of them recognized it in their organic law, 
or respected it in their treatment of individuals. But 
it is none the less true, that it is the common founda- 
tion on which they are all built. Their very existence 
implied and assumed it, and created a logical necessity, 
that sooner or later it should be openly recognized and 
practically applied. 

Many writers of great ability and great influence over 
the public mind seem to me to have fallen into a fatal 
mistake in their treatment of this subject. In relation 
to religious liberty, they cannot ses that Protestantism 
has any advantage over the papal church. Neither 
party respected religious liberty in practice. Both com- 
pelled submission to the established church by the 
strong hand of power. Both are chargeable with the 
shameful crime of persecuting men for their religious 
opinions, or at least for avowing them and acting upon 
them. Some go so far as to tell us, that the advantage 
on the whole is with the papal party, for they are con- 
sistent with their avowed principles. The papal church, 
we are told, has been constructed for ages upon the 
principle, that the head of the church has unlimited con- 



RELIGIOUS LIBERTY. 215 

trol conferred by God himself over all individual con- 
science ; and that therefore when it resorts to persecution, 
it acts consistently with itself, and applies its own 
fundamental principles in practice. Protestantism on 
the other hand, when it resorts to persecution, is fatally 
inconsistent with itself. It refuses to concede to the 
rest of mankind that religious liberty of which its very 
existence is a solemn assertion. 

It cannot be denied that when Protestants persecute, 
they are guilty of just such an inconsistency. A perse- 
cuting Protestant church commits suicide. It denies 
its own right to be. The papal church is chargeable 
with no such inconsistency. It is in its own nature, 
and by virtue of its own fundamental principles, con- 
sistently and tenaciously held, the enemy of the religious 
liberty of mankind. But it seems strange that learned 
and able men should fail to perceive, that this consis- 
tency of the papal church is a stigma of lasting reproach, 
and that this inconsistency of Protestantism is, in a 
comparison of the two systems, an imperishable badge 
of honor. It may be said and often has been, that the 
leaders of Protestantism were hypocritical, that they 
refused to concede to others those rights which they 
claimed for themselves. This it is said is a strange 
anomaly. The reply is, it is no anomaly at all ; or if an 
anomaly, it is so common as to take away all its strange- 
ness. Luther before the Diet of Worms had a sublime 
intuition of his own rights of conscience as an individual 
subject of the government of God. If it is asked, why 
he did not equally perceive that all other men have the 
same rights, the answer is very obvious. Psychologists 
tell us, that there are certain truths which in their appli- 
cation to particular cases all men intuitively perceive, 
while very few ever generalize them and assert their 
universality. There is, for example, no man who, on 



2l6 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

perceiving that some change has taken place in the 
material things around him, does not intuitively perceive, 
that that change must be due to some adequate cause. 
If a tree is found standing where a little while before 
there was no tree, he knows some hand must have 
planted it. If an hour ago on leaving his room he 
knows that his watch was on the table, but on returning 
he finds it not there, he is sure some hand must have 
taken it away. But, the number of men who generalize 
this intuition, and assert the universal truth, that every 
change is caused, is very small. 

The same thing holds true in a pre-eminent degree 
of our moral intuitions. Between that clear discern- 
ment of his own rights of conscience which Luther so 
grandly affirmed on the occasion referred to, and the 
generalization of that intuition into the universal law of 
religious liberty, there is a long step of social progress, 
which experience shows that it often requires genera- 
tions to accomplish. The fact that Luther and his 
associates discerned that intuition in its application to 
a particular case, but did not generalize it, does not 
prove that they were hypocrites, but only that they 
were subject to those weaknesses and limitations which 
attach to all humanity. The framers of the Declaration 
of Independence were not p roved to be hypocrites by 
the fact, that they declared that " men have certain 
inalienable rights, among which are life, liberty and the 
pursuit of happiness," while yet hundreds of thousands 
of their fellow-citizens were reduced by existing laws to 
the condition of chattels and beasts of burden. The 
existence of that declaration in the document in which 
the beginning of our national life was announced to the 
world, is justly regarded as one of the most glorious 
facts in our national history. Its insertion in that docu- 
ment was not an act of hypocrisy, but an honest asser- 



RELIGIOUS LIBERTY. 217 

tion of a great truth to which the history of the nation 
was to give practical effect. 

The reformers never thought of denying the right of 
the papal church to require and compel men to accept 
the truth of God. They had no generalization, as has 
been shown, of the intuition of moral freedom. What 
they complained of was, not the assumed right to legis- 
late in a matter of conscience, but that the doctrines 
imposed on them by authority were not the truth of 
God, but impious falsehoods. They were entirely sure 
that they themselves discerned them to be falsehoods, 
and therefore refused to accept them in obedience to 
any human authority. If the pope would have listened 
to their arguments, and made those changes in the doc- 
trines and practices of the church which they saw to be 
necessary, it would never have occurred to them to 
demand that he should renounce his right to legislate 
in matters of conscience. This they had never called 
in question. When therefore it became necessary to 
construct the reformed churches, no doubt ever occurred 
to them of their right to reject the errors of the papacy, 
and to give legal effect to an ecclesiastical system con- 
structed, as they intended theirs should be, in accord- 
ance with the word of God. They had separated them- 
selves from the papal church because it sought to impose 
on them, in the name of Christianity, a system of doc- 
trine which they saw to be false and impious. They 
intended to give to the people of the countries in which 
they organized national churches no such justification 
of dissent. It never occurred to them that their refusal 
to accept the false system on the authority of the papal 
church was inconsistent with requiring men to submit 
to a true system on the authority of a Protestant church, 
or that other men would rightfully claim to exercise 
that private judgment in relation to the doctrines of 



2l8 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

Protestantism, which they had claimed for themselves 
in their conflict with the pope. They were honest and 
sincere in their assertion of it, but they saw it only as 
an individual right, not as a generalization. 

This assertion of the doctrine of religious liberty by 
which the reformers justified their own conduct was not 
only honest and sincere, but it committed the Reforma- 
tion to that principle for all the future ; and the over- 
ruling providence of God has well-known methods of 
so ho- ding communities and nations to such commit- 
ments, as to render escape from them impossible. This 
is strikingly proved by our own national history. It is 
true that the Declaration of Independence liberated no 
slaves. It is true that, for more than fifty years after 
the publication of that declaration, the number of slaves 
in our country increased with terrible rapidity, and the 
bondage in which they were held became more rigorous 
and cruel. Again and again the rulers and legislators 
of the nation entered -into solemn league and covenant 
to make the iniquity perpetual. Yet it is also true, that 
the insertion of that declaration of human rights in the 
charter of the nation's existence did .actually secure, in 
the progress of events, universal personal liberty over 
every foot of our territory. The providence of God 
brought us at length to a crisis, when we must make 
our election, whether to cease from being a nation, or 
fulfil our pledges of universal liberty. Irresistible 
necessity compelled us to choose the latter. 

It is always so in respect to those commitments given 
by communities in favor of fundamental laws of right- 
eousness. The providence of God never permits them 
to remain a dead letter. This is most strikingly true 
of those recognitions of the doctrine of religious liberty, 
which occurred in the origin of Protestantism. They 
rendered it inevitable that, in the progress of the ages, 



RELIGIOUS LIBERTY. 219 

Protestantism would be found on the side of liberty of 
conscience, just as the commitments of the papal church 
in the same conflicts, in favor of the enslavement of the 
human conscience to the authority of the papal hier- 
archy, compelled that church to remain the perpetual 
enemy of religious liberty, and bear as best she can all 
the consequences of the position she has chosen. 

The causes which are constantly compelling all 
Protestant churches to accept and practically apply 
that doctrine of religious liberty which is implied in 
their very existence are obvious and irresistible. There 
are two reasons why they have acted with much less 
rapidity in the churches of the Continent, than in those 
of England and Scotland. One of those reasons is, that 
in the Continental churches the Reformation originated 
in a few leading minds, and was achieved by them in 
co-operation with the reigning sovereigns. The mass 
of the people had only to accept with enthusiasm the 
boon which was provided for them by their sovereigns 
and their spiritual guides. It was not a product of any 
popular uprising. In England, so far as the Reforma- 
tion was political, the people were far enough from any 
participation in it ; but by far the more powerful ele- 
ment was not political, but popular and personal, result- 
ing from profound individual conviction. The seeds 
which Wicklyffe had planted a hundred and fifty years 
earlier could never be eradicated from English soil. 
They were the germs of the English Reformation. The 
great movement on the Continent only quickened them 
to a more active and vigorous growth. This deep pop- 
ular element was never for a moment satisfied with such 
scanty reformation as Henry VIII. and the bishops 
were disposed to grant. From the first there was deep 
dissatisfaction with a semi-papal church, and a widely 
prevalent longing for a radically reformed church. The 



220 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

nation was never for a moment at rest under the national 
church which her original Refoimation gave her, and 
new outbreaks of dissent were of almost constant 
occurrence. 

The other reason why the progress of practical relig- 
ious liberty was comparatively slow on the Continent 
is to be found in the fact, that the governments were 
for the most part absolute and independent of the pop- 
ular will. For this reason dissent had few opportunities 
of organizing itself, so as to offer any formidable resist- 
ance to authority. It was therefore easily repressed, 
and the Protestant national church exercised universal 
control, and enjoyed a tranquil existence for several 
generations. Greater religious liberty was not granted, 
because it was never energetically demanded. In 
Britain it was far otherwise. The English Tuclors and 
Stuarts were despotic enough in spirit, but they could 
never be absolute in fact. The monarchy was never 
strong enough to repress that deep ground-swell of 
popular conviction, which never ceased to demand a 
thoroughly reformed church. The earnest masses from 
whence this demand proceeded had as clear an intuition 
of their right of private judgment against the church of 
Henry VIII., as Luther had against the Church of Rome. 
That conviction was deepened and strengthened by all 
the precedents of the Reformation. When Henry VIII. 
sent a papist to execution for denying his supremacy, 
the Protestant masses vividly felt that the Protestant 
who was borne to execution in the same hurdle for deny- 
ing transubstantiation, had as good right to reject the 
doctrines of a king as the king had to put men to death 
for adhering to the pope. This conviction must and 
did fasten itself deeply upon the mind of the nation, 
and became a permanent force in English history, com- 
pelling the government and the state church to yield 



RELIGIOUS LIBERTY. 22 1 

more and more to the demands of religious liberty. 
The advocates of a more thorough church reform were 
often obliged to assert their right of private judgment on 
the scaffold and at the stake. But when called to 
preach their doctrine of religious liberty from such pul- 
pits, they appealed with all the more power to that 
original assertion of it, which the very existence of the 
Reformation implied, and deepened the conviction of 
its truth in the heart of the nation. From the first it 
was impossible that the English Reformation should 
ever enjoy an hour of tranquillity, except in the universal 
practical recognition of religious liberty. Much the 
same may be said of the history of religious liberty in 
Scotland. 

This long conflict in England, lasting for three cen- 
turies, resulted not only in the complete establishment 
of the principle in that country, but in making it a part 
of the fundamental law of society among all the popula- 
tions of the world which have sprung from English 
colonization. The vast prevalence of absolute religious 
liberty over regions of the earth so extensive, and among 
populations so prosperous and wealthy is a result of 
the English Reformation ; and it is a fact scarcely less 
important and promising of beneficent results than any 
other in modern history. As has been already stated, 
for the most part the progress of religious liberty in the 
Protestant countries of Continental Europe has been 
less rapid ; but it has been real, and promises erelong 
to become universal and complete. It is surely a matter 
of wonder, that any well-informed man can fail to per- 
ceive, that in respect to religious liberty, the two systems 
which met each other face to face on the battle-fields of 
the Reformation have ever since, by a necessity of their 
own natures, been moving onward toward results the 
most contradictory. The papal power represents the 



222 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

enslavement of the conscience of man to the pope and 
the hierarchy ; and in every country it is unfailingly true 
to its fundamental law. If it can grasp and hold the 
sword of Caesar, it never fails to wield it to repress dis- 
sent, and compel the submission of the reluctant. If 
the sword has fallen from its grasp, it still boasts that 
it holds the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and compels 
the submission of reluctant wills by ghostly terrors, and 
its control of the destinies of the invisible world. 

Protestantism on the other hand is irretrievably com- 
mitted by its own first principle to religious liberty. 
Protestant churches may violate it, and often have done 
so ; but sooner or later they will be compelled to recog- 
nize it. In the beginning of the war of the Rebellion our 
armies sometimes trampled on the rights of the negroes ; 
but those men, degraded as they were, knew instinc- 
tively that in the long run the Federal government must 
protect their rights. There is in Protestantism a similar 
necessity of protecting religious liberty. Its origin and 
its history give full assurance, that wherever it bears 
rule, religious liberty must become the fundamental law 
of society. Protestantism means the enfranchisement 
of the conscience, just as the papal church means 
its enslavement. 



PART III. 



THE CHURCH OF MODERN CHRISTENDOM. 



CHAPTER I. 

THE ORIGIN OF MODERN SECTS. 

The words placed at the head of this chapter suggest 
to the mind a class of phenomena which are certainly 
among the most characteristic, and I think all will- 
admit the most painful to contemplate, which we en- 
counter in studying the history of Protestantism. They 
are unique. They are not like the early sects of Chris- 
tianity. These were for the most part parties within 
the body of the church itself, not separate organizations, 
each claiming to be the church or at least a church of 
Christ. Any one may satisfy himself of this by consult- 
ing the histories of those controversies in any of the 
standard works on church history. 1 As a consequence 
of this fact, all those sects were of comparatively short 
duration. They were conflicts in the bosom of the 
church, and came to an end by one party or the other, 
by fair means or foul, gaining entire ascendency. It is 
unnecessary to waste words in showing how widely this 
differs from the aspect under which we see' sect in our 

1 Waddingtoa's Ch Hist., Chap. VII., "Arian Controversy." 



224 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

own times. Nor are there any similar phenomena in 
the long interval between these early controversies and 
the Reformation. There is indeed the great schism 
between the Eastern and Western churches. But each 
of these bodies set up the exclusive claim of being the 
church of Christ, and anathematized the other. Each 
regarded the other as a rebellion and a usurpation. 
There are among the sects of Protestantism some similar 
cases, but they are by no means numerous. This is not 
the prevailing attitude of Protestant sects towards each 
other. 

It is my design in this chapter to inquire into the 
origin and causes of this peculiar order of things, which 
it must be admitted very extensively prevails among 
the Christian people that adopt the principles of the 
Reformation. The reader will at once recognize this 
as one of the most common topics of popular declama- 
tion, both from the pulpit and the platform. It is also 
a favorite theme of our periodical literature, both papal 
and Protestant, both secular and religious. It may 
generally be remarked however that the subjects most 
discussed are the subjects least understood, just as 
there are no diseases for which quacks propound so 
many infallible remedies, as for those which in relation 
to our present knowledge, are quite incurable. The 
very frequency with which men return again and again 
to the discussion of this threadbare subject is a striking 
proof that the public mind is ill at ease in respect to it, 
and that men are by no means satisfied with any of the 
numerous solutions of the question which have thus 
far been proposed. This consideration may be a salu- 
tary warning to a wise man, that he can have no hope 
of success where so many have failed ; but it at least 
gives one the assurance, that the public mind is unsat- 
isfied, and longing for truth which has not yet been 



THE ORIGIN OF MODERN SECTS. 225 

discovered. While this state of facts continues, the 
discussion of the subject cannot cease. 

A very large majority of all those who write and 
speak on the subject would be perfectly unanimous in 
the belief that it is not necessary to look far to discover 
the causes of these phenomena. They tell us with the 
utmost assurance, that the religious divisions of our 
times are due to two causes : religious liberty, and the 
necessary limitations of all human knowledge ; that as 
no human mind has a perfect knowledge of anything, 
it is impossible any two minds should have exactly the 
same view of any subject; and that therefore, if men 
enjoy liberty of thought and speech, they will be divided 
into parties and sects on all subjects, religion not ex- 
cepted. He who accepts this as a full account of the 
matter demonstrates at least the shallowness of his own 
thinking. Such considerations may account for the 
existence of great diversity of religious opinion, but 
afford no explanation at all of the phenomena of relig- 
ious sects, as we daily witness them. 

If the existence of great diversity of opinion were 
alone adequate to explain the present sectarian condi- 
tion of Protestantism in all countries where religious 
freedom is enjoyed, then ought the same cause to pro- 
duce similar phenomena in respect to all other questions 
which deeply affect human thought and human well- 
being. The medical profession for example should 
present sects in all respects analogous to those of Chris- 
tianity. But he has studied the subject very superficially 
who does not perceive that such is by no means the 
fact. Great diversities of opinion on medical subjects 
there certainly are, perhaps as great as on religious 
subjects. Among intelligent, educated physicians there 
are perhaps two or three great schools of opinion, so 
irreconcilable to each other, that those who hold them 
'5 



226 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

refuse any intercommunion as members of a common 
profession. But these differences originate at the bed- 
side of the patient. Physicians of the different schools 
have no professional fellowship with each other, because 
they cannot, so long as what one relies on as the means 
of saving life and restoring health, the other believes to 
be quite useless or positively injurious. There are 
religious divisions of the same character, and where 
such differences of opinion exist, it is plain there can 
be no religious fraternity or co-operation. There ought 
to be none. But he who supposes that this expresses 
the state of facts which for the most part exists between 
different Protestant sects, has surely viewed the subject 
very superficially, and at a very great distance. He 
has not sufficiently studied the phenomena cf the relig- 
ious life of our times to form any trustworthy opinion 
of them. In most cases the fact lies upon the very 
surface of things, that the diversities of opinion which 
separate the different religious sects from each other 
are not regarded on # either side as pertaining to the 
essential nature of Christianity, or as sustaining any 
very important relation to the great end which Chris- 
tianity aims to accomplish, the reformation and salva- 
tion of sinful men. It is a most familiar and common 
occurrence, that when the Christian bodies in any com- 
munity become deeply impressed with the necessity of 
putting forth extraordinary efforts to persuade men to 
repent, by the vigorous application of the great reforma- 
tory forces of Christianity, they deliberately, for the 
time being, forget the differences which divide them 
from one another, and glory in the fact, that faith and 
fervor for the common truth have risen so high, that the 
landmarks of sect can nowhere be discerned. They 
exult in the fact, that they have all a common salvation. 
Around the bedside of men sick and dying of the disease 



THE ORIGIN OF MODERN SECTS. 227 

of sin, they have no diversities of opinion, they have 
a common remedy and a common faith in it. As soon 
as this season of extraordinary effort is past, the waters 
will recede to their ordinary level, and the landmarks 
of sect will be everywhere discernible as before. 

Can a parallel be found for these facts in the medical 
profession ? Do homoeopathic and allopathic practi- 
tioners, when impelled by a sense of the necessity of 
extraordinary effort to protect the health and save the 
lives of the people, as for example when pestilence 
invades, quite forget their differences, and unite in com- 
mon endeavor, and the use of the same remedies ? 
Every one knows that in such circumstances profes- 
sional antipathies are peculiarly strong, because each 
school thinks the other is destroying the lives of the 
people. Besides these differences of opinion on funda- 
mental points which render co-operation impossible, 
there are in the medical profession innumerable minor 
diversities of opinion, which have no tendency at all to 
impair its unity. If there were among Christians no 
causes tending to divide them into sects, other than the 
limitations of human knowledge, and the freedom of 
thought and opinion, the phenomena of the religious 
world would be precisely analogous to those of the 
medical profession. Fundamental differences in respect 
to the nature of the remedy which God has provided 
for the moral diseases of men would occasion perma- 
nent and incurable divisions; and the more earnest 
Christian people were in efforts to promote the moral 
health of the community, the more irreconcilable those 
divisions would appear. Innumerable diversities of 
opinion on points of minor importance would have no 
tendency to break out into permanent schisms, or to 
impair the oneness of the Christian brotherhood. Our 
illustration has been drawn from the medical profession, 



2 28 THE KEYS OI< SECT. 

but any other department of human thought and effort 
could have supplied it. 

Partial ignorance therefore in the midst of perfect 
freedom furnishes no explanation of the phenomena of 
religious sect as we are acquainted with them. We 
must find some other cause or causes, or acknowledge 
ourselves ignorant of the subject. We shall find those 
causes nowhere but in the past history of Christianity. 
Modern sect originated where the spiritual despotism 
of the Middle Ages originated, in the corruption of 
Christianity in the early ages of its history. Both these 
phenomena grew from the same roots and the same 
seeds. I am not sanguine enough to expect this propo- 
sition to be believed without proof. 

If it is conceded that the Founder of Christianity 
made it clearly apparent, that he intended to place the 
rites of baptism and the Lord's Supper in the hands of 
a self perpetuating priestly corporation, to be by them 
dispensed to the people, and made it easy in every suc- 
cessive age to determine who are the genuine successors 
of the original corporators, then no such phenomena as 
those of Protestant sect would have been possible. 
The refusal of any number of people professing them- 
selves to be Christians to submit to the authority of 
that corporation would have been obvious rebellion 
against the head and supreme law of the church uni- 
versal. All persons so refusing would have renounced 
their membership in the church of Christ, and excluded 
themselves from all its privileges. They would not 
have been Christian but anti-Christian sects. 

On the other hand, if it is conceded that the Founder 
of Christianity never instituted any such corporation, 
or gave any hint that it w r as his wish or intention that 
it should exist, if he committed the rites of baptism and 
the Lord's Supper to no priestly hands, but enjoined 



THE ORIGIN OF MODERN SECTS. 229 

their free observance by all Christian people as badges 
of loyalty to him, without the intervention of any priestly 
administration, then also the phenomena of modern 
sect would have been impossible. Wide differences of 
opinion would have existed, and some of them would 
have been so fundamental as to render mutual co-opera- 
tion and recognition impossible. From these differences 
permanent separation would have resulted into irrecon- 
cilable sects ; and the more earnest men were to apply 
Christianity as an instrument for producing its appro- 
priate results, the more irreconcilable these differences 
would have appeared. Such divisions in respect to 
Christianity it would have been neither possible nor 
desirable to avoid. In spiritual as in carnal warfare, it 
is eminently desirable that men should have the power 
of distinguishing friends from foes. 

Besides these fundamental differences of opinion, 
there would still have been innumerable minor diver- 
sities, but they would have had no more tendency to 
divide believers in Christ into rival sects, as we see 
them divided, than the minor disagreements of physi- 
cians among themselves have to produce a like factious 
condition of the medical profession. For example, one 
man might have thought that in the act of baptism the 
whole body should be immersed, while another was of 
the opinion that to apply water by sprinkling or pouring 
was equally appropriate and more convenient. Each 
would have acted according to his own conviction, and 
such a difference of opinion would have had no tendency 
to hinder the most perfect fraternization of those who 
held them. 

Once more, if it is conceded that the Founder of 
Christianity intended to place the rites of baptism and 
the Lord's Supper in such a sense under the guardian- 
ship of some ecclesiastical corporation, that that corpo- 



230 • THE KEYS OF SECT. 

ration should have the power of binding and loosing as 
it is understood, that it should hold the keys of the 
kingdom of heaven as that language has been so often 
interpreted, that no one could gain admission to these 
Christian rites except through such a corporation ; and 
if at the same time he laid down no definite rules, no 
organic principles according to which such a corpora- 
tion should be constituted, no definition of its powers 
and no delineation of the method by which they should 
be exercised, then would all the phenomena of Protes- 
tant sect become inevitable and perpetual. In other 
words, if Jesus Christ required the existence in his 
church of a corporation with such judicial powers, and 
yet entirely neglected to define the constitution of that 
corporation and the limitations of its powers, then he 
himself became responsible for all the phenomena of 
Protestant sect. He planted the seed and it was sure 
to spring up and bear fruit after his kind. For example, 
under this order of things a majority of the corporation 
that holds the keys are of the opinion that sprinkling 
is the more convenient mode of applying water in bap- 
tism, and therefore requires that it shall be so applied. 
A minority of the brotherhood holds that sprinkling is 
not baptism, and therefore withdraws from the brother- 
hood and organizes another corporation to hold the 
keys which will admit no baptism but immersion, and 
suffer none but the immersed to participate in the 
Lord's Supper. Thus two sects have originated differ- 
ing in nothing but in the mode of applying water 
in baptism ; and yet experience shows that these 
two sects are likely not only to stand over against 
each other for ages, but to produce a schism in the 
Christian body wherever religious liberty exists. It is 
not religious liberty, but a false interpretation of the 
phrase, " keys of the kingdom of heaven," which has 



THE ORIGIN OF MODERN SECTS. 23 1 

iendered this melancholy division of the Lord's people 
possible. 

It is important however to observe that it is not 
necessary to the accomplishment of this separation, that 
both parties should retain the power of the keys. It 
will equally take place if one of them insists on this 
power, while the other rejects it. If for example in 
the case given above one party debars from the Lord's 
Supper all persons who have not been immersed, while 
the other party refuses to submit to immersion but 
throws no barrier in the way of any disciple of Christ 
who wishes to honor him in the observance of this rite, 
in whatever manner he may have received baptism, the 
separation will be just as complete and permanent as 
though both parties insisted on the power of the keys. 
But there will be this important difference in the two 
cases. If both had retained the power of the keys, 
both would be equally responsible for causing and per- 
petuating the schism. If one of the parties has usurped 
no control over the Christian rites, it will have cleared 
itself of all responsibility for the separation, and also 
of any liability to create new schisms in its own body 
by the usurpation of lordship over the consciences of 
its members. This principle must always be borne in 
mind in estimating the responsibility of any Christian 
body for being separated by sectarian lines from other 
Christian people. 

Whichever of the distinct religious bodies which 
divide, hot only Protestant countries but all Christendom, 
is subjected to analysis, we shall find at its root a germ 
on which its existence depends; and that germ will 
always be an assumed control of the rites of baptism 
and the Lord's Supper by the exercise of corporate 
power, and with very few exceptions the assumption is 
also made that these rites can only be exhibited by the 



232 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

exercise of a clerical function for the performance of 
which ordination by the laying on of hands is a neces- 
sary qualification. No such division of Christendom 
into distinct and rival governments as that which now 
exists could have been possible, without these assump- 
tions or at least one of them. On the one hand, it has 
been shown in the progress of this work how funda- 
mental these two assumptions are to the papal church, 
and how inevitably, in the then existing conditions of 
Christendom, that church grew out of them. If on the 
other hand we examine one of the Christian bodies of 
the present time, which is perhaps as far removed as 
any one that can be named from the papal church, we 
shall find one of these assumptions at least essential, to 
its existence. I refer especially to that body of Chris- 
tians which largely grew up under the influence of the 
late Alexander Campbell. In that body, the Lord's 
Supper is not subjected to any clerical or corporate 
control. It is left free to be observed by the Christian 
brotherhood, without the intervention of any priestly 
function. Neither is the exhibition of baptism a priestly 
function. The only assumption by which the separate 
existence of the sect was created and is maintained is, 
that the church in its corporate capacity rigidly requires 
that all its members shall be immersed. It dictates the 
action by which the water shall be applied in the rite. 
The sect retains its separate existence only by this 
shadow of the power of the keys. These two examples 
may be considered as occupying the two extremes, and 
all other religious bodies occupy some intermediate 
position, and the assumption of the power in some 
form is a condition of their continued separate existence. 
It is necessary however to remark, that there are 
some so-called Christian bodies which have a distinc- 
tive name and a feeble organization, and yet their sepa- 



THE ORIGIN OF MODERN SECTS. 233 

ration from the rest of Christendom depends, not much 
on the use they make of Christian rites, for they make 
very little use of them, and hold them in very low 
esteem, but on their negation of that doctrine of Christ 
on which for the most part the faith and order of Chris- 
tendom rests. To these the above analysis is not 
applicable. I .am concerned with those who embrace 
Christianity, and not with those who reject it. 

There is no difficulty therefore in pointing out the 
one cause without the presence of which the existence 
of the phenomena of sect as we witness them would be 
impossible. It is the very same departure from the 
principles of the primitive church which created the 
church of the Middle Ages. But since the Reforma- 
tion, the development of this cause has been greatly 
facilitated and quickened by other causes. The island 
of Great Britain has been the hot-bed of sect. It has 
already been remarked, that the Reformation in Eng- 
land was the product of two great social movements 
not only distinct from but contradictory to each other. 
One of them was political, originating in the royal will. 
This party sought entire separation from Rome and the 
aggrandizement of royal prerogative, and beyond this 
to reform as little as possible. The other movement 
was religious and devout, and desired to reform in all 
things in accordance with the doctrine and law of 
Christ. Originally this party would have been satisfied 
with such a reformed national church as that of Luther 
or Calvin. But the party of the court and the bishops 
would consent to no such thorough work of reform, and 
sought to satisfy the nation with a church conforming 
much more nearly to that from which they had sepa- 
rated. With this the more religious party were never 
satisfied. The stringent and often harsh and severe 
measures of the court and the bishops to compel uni- 



234 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

versal conformity to the national church, not only in 
the minutest but often the most puerile details of cere- 
mony and clerical vestments, created additional discon- 
tent, and drove earnest and devout minds to a more 
radical and- thorough investigation of the nature and 
powers of the Christian church, and the spiritual rights 
and privileges of the Lord's people. The further they 
prosecuted these inquiries, the wider was their dissent 
from a church which retained many of the despotic 
principles of the papal hierarchy, and many of the 
superstitions which had originated in ages of darkness 
and error, and the more earnest and imperative was 
their demand for a reformation of the national church 
more radical and thorough than would have been at 
first demanded. At length despairing of any relief 
within the national church, they were driven to the 
necessity of separating from it, and churches were 
organized not only distinct from the national church, 
but adopting that principle of local independency, 
according to which all the churches of apostolic times 
were constructed. Against such separate organizations 
all the power of the court and the national hierarchy 
was exerted. In the heat of the persecution, some fled 
to Holland where greater liberty of worship was enjoyed. 
Many fled across the Atlantic to the inhospitable wilds 
of New England and made for themselves a home in 
the New World, where they could enjoy the inestimable 
privilege of worshipping God according to their own 
conscientious convictions. Others remained still in 
England under great hardships and disabilities, and 
from them sprung the numerous and powerful body of 
English Independents as it exists at the present time. 

According to principles already explained, the Baptist 
body was soon separated from the Independents, on 
account of the different method of applying water in 



THE ORIGIN OF MODERN SECTS. 235 

baptism, and also on account of a difference in practice 
in reference to the baptism of infants. The same times 
of heated controversy generated another sect in Eng- 
land, which at first view seems to be an exception to 
the generalizations of this chapter. I refer of course 
to the Friends or Quakers. This sect can however 
after all hardly be regarded as exceptional. They 
separated themselves from all other Christian people 
by rejecting all external religious ceremonies, baptism 
and the Lord's Supper included. Other Christian 
bodies determined by corporate action who should be 
admitted to the enjoyment of Christian rites, and who 
excluded from them. By a like exercise of corporate 
power, the Friends excluded all from these rites, and 
pronounced the rites themselves unchristian. Not less 
than other sects they determined by corporate power 
the relation of all Christian disciples to baptism and 
the Lord's Supper, and by so doing made themselves a 
sect separate from all the rest of the Christian world. 
This sect has been perpetuated in England till the 
present time ; and in the year 1682, a body of men 
belonging to the society of Friends, under the leader- 
ship of William Penn, founded the city of Philadelphia, 
and the State of Pennsylvania. Members of this sect 
settled also in Rhode Island at an early day. 

Not far from the middle of the eighteenth century, 
the Wesleys and their associates attempted to revive 
the faith and fervor of apostolic times in the English 
national church, and both within and without the church 
a great spiritual movement was the result. John Wesley 
the organizer of the reform had no intention whatever 
of revolutionizing the polity of the national church. 
Like the reformers of the sixteenth century, he aimed, 
not at changes in polity, but at the revival of spiritual 
religion. But in his efforts to promote this end, he 



236 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

was driven to the use of measures which the authorities 
of the national church did not approve, and could not 
be persuaded to sanction. Mr. Wesley was sincerely 
attached to the established church, and very averse to 
the idea of separating from it. But all hope was at 
last abandoned of securing any such enlargement of 
the toleration of the church, as would comprehend Mr. 
Wesley's followers, and a necessity which was deeply 
regretted by the leaders of the movement, compelled 
them to become and to remain a separate sect in Eng- 
land. Emigration bore this sect to the United States. 
It has here increased very rapidly, and has for many 
years occupied a very prominent position among the 
religious bodies which divide the Christian people of 
the United States. 

Emigration also transplanted the national church 
itself to American soil, where it exists, like all other 
religious bodies, as a distinct sect, having no political 
power or connection with the state, one of the very 
numerous, sisterhood of American sects. Thus five of 
the sects which divide the population of England and 
the United States and indeed of all English-speaking 
countries, originated either directly from the Reforma- 
tion itself, or from the efforts of the more radical party, 
to obtain a reform more thorough than the civil and 
ecclesiastical authorities which controlled the national 
church could be persuaded to grant. Had the govern- 
ment of England been as absolute as those of the Conti- 
nent, and had the state church been as thorough in its 
reforms as the reformed churches of the Continent were, 
probably these divisions might not have taken place, or 
might have been much less extensive and influential. 
But the seeds of liberty which were early planted in 
the British constitution, and which its sovereigns, how- 
ever despotic in character, could never eradicate, ren- 



THE ORIGIN OF MODERN SECTS. 237 

dered it impossible that the cravings of the national 
heart for more thorough reformation should be repressed 
by the strong hand of power. The integrity and un- 
relenting exclusiveness of the English Church has been 
maintained by making England the hot-bed of sect for 
the whole English-speaking world. 

In Scotland, much the same result has been reached, 
though by a different process. The principle however 
has been the same. The state church which was con- 
stituted at the Reformation was Presbyterian, closely 
conforming to that which Calvin established at Geneva. 
Its fundamental conception was that all church power 
was originally lodged in the highest church judicatory, 1 
and that between this judicatory and the government 
of the state the most intimate union should exist. At 
times the church might rather be said to be supreme 
over the state than the state over the church. In the 
exercise of this centralized ecclesiastical power, the 
church sought to secure throughout Scotland the most 
absolute uniformity, both of doctrine and worship. But 
the whole body of the Scotch clergy were active mem- 
bers of the judicatories of the church, and eligible to 
seats in the General Assembly. In the deliberations of 
these judicatories, differences of opinion were constantly 
liable to arise, and to excite such a degree of conscien- 
tious zeal, that the majority would not tolerate the 
minority, and the minority would not submit to the 
majority. The result was that what was one Presby- 
terian church of Scotland would, by the secession of 
the minority, become two Presbyterian churches, per- 
fectly alike in constitution, and differing from each 
other only in respect to the particular matter in contro- 
versy ; the church of the majority remaining the national 

1 See Hetherington's History of Church of Scotland. 



238 THE KEYS 07 SECT. 

church, and the church of the minority becoming a dis- 
senting sect. This process has been repeated in the 
history of the church of Scotland, till she numbers six 
Presbyterian sects, including the national church, which 
differs from the rest only in being supported by the 
state. 1 

Independency is also an original product of Scotland 
as well as of England. It originated there at the close 
of the last century, and resulted from the efforts of two 
laymen, John Haldane and Robert Aikman, to evan- 
gelize the neglected and half-heathenized masses that 
were then found in Edinburgh. It was no part of their 
intention to found a sect or a polity. Though having 
received no ordination, they found themselves moved 
by the spirit of God to preach the gospel to the poor, 
and, in the true spirit of primitive Christianity, they 
baptized converts in the name of the Father and of the 
Son and of the Holy Ghost, and in the great congrega- 
tions that thronged to hear the word of God from their 
lips, they united with the whole multitude of the disci- 
ples in " showing forth the Lord's death till he come." 
In their outset, their churches were simply an affirma- 
tion of the liberty wherewith Christ maketh his people 
free, and a solemn protest against that ecclesiastical 
sacramentalism, which had been for two centuries filling 
Scotland with warring sects. How far they have re- 
tained the apostolic character of their beginnings to the 
present time I am not well informed. 

From the Reformation to the English Revolution of 
1688, the friends of prelacy never entirely relinquished 
their efforts to subjugate the church of Scotland to 
Episcopal rule. After the union of its crown with that 

1 Essays on Christian Union, Essay V., by Rev. David King, 
LL. D. London, 1851. 



THE ORIGIN OF MODERN SECT: 



■39 



of England, the sovereigns of England made very per- 
sistent efforts to accomplish this object by a despotic 
exercise of royal prerogative. These efforts subjected 
Scotland to great civil and religious agitations and con- 
vulsions, and bore a very important part in bringing on 
the great rebellion which cost Charles I. his crown and 
his life. Under Charles II. the attempt was again 
renewed with the most despotic cruelty, and was so far 
successful that, though at the revolution the church of 
Scotland under its Presbyterian form was permanently 
recognized as a national church, there still remained in 
Scotland an offshoot of the English national church 
which, though divested of any connection with the state, 
still holds its place as one of the numerous sects among 
which the people of Scotland are divided. Thus Scot- 
land has been even more prolific than England in sects ; 
and as all its sects have been transplanted by emigra- 
tion, it has contributed very largely to the very numer- 
ous sisterhood of sects found in all English-speaking 
countries. 

It will be seen then that three causes have been 
essentially concerned in that multiplication of sects 
which originated in Great Britain, and has been trans- 
planted to all British colonies. The first of these is 
the persistent claim of the power of the keys in the 
hands of an ecclesiastical corporation. This comes 
from the Middle Ages and the corruptions of the early 
centuries of Christian history. The second of these 
causes is the growing religious liberty which was the 
product of the Reformation. The third is the effort of 
the national churches of England and Scotland to com- 
pel' uniformity of faith and worship, constantly resisted 
by a longing desire for more perfect reformation and 
greater spiritual liberty. 

The national reformed churches of the Continent 



240 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

have also contributed something to the multiplication 
of sects in modern Christendom, though far less than 
England and Scotland In the original construction 
of those churches, the demand of the several nations 
for a thorough and satisfactory reform of religion was 
not repressed and restrained by the combined efforts 
of civil and ecclesiastical power, as it was in England. 
The people were satisfied, and there was therefore little 
to awaken the spirit of dissent. On the other hand the 
governments were absolute, and strong enough easily 
to repress any tendencies to dissent which might be 
manifested. For these reasons sects have not been 
multiplied in the Protestant countries of the Continent. 
But during the three hundred years and more which 
have elapsed since the beginning of the Reformation, 
emigration from various European countries has greatly 
enlarged the area of European civilization, by extend- 
ing it over vast regions of the earth, the existence of 
which was only made known to Europe at the end of 
the fifteenth century. To this emigration the Protestant 
countries of Europe have largely contributed, and their 
emigrant population have carried with them their attach- 
ment to the national churches of their fathers. It has 
not often been in their power to make that church 
national in the countries to which they have emigrated. 
But if in those countries they have found religious 
liberty, they have not generally amalgamated them- 
selves' with the existing religious institutions of the 
country, but have constructed for themselves a church 
without any connection with the state indeed, but in all 
other respects after the model of their fatherland. 
Thus in our country, and in most other countries which 
have been peopled by comparatively recent emigration 
from Europe, offshoots will be found from most of the 
national Protestant churches, occupying places of more 



THE ORIGIN OF MODERN SECTS. 2/j.I 

or less prominence among existing sects. Thus most 
of the national Protestant churches have added at least 
one to the number of sects which have come to this 
country in swarms from England and Scotland. The 
same thing happens in other countries, whose unused 
resources and ample religious freedom invite immigra- 
tion from the whole civilized world. Lutheranism in 
Germany is a national church ; in all countries to which 
German emigrants go, it is a sect. The national church 
of Holland is substantially Presbyterian ; but the Dutch 
who emigrated to this country, instead of uniting with 
Presbyterians from other countries, organized a sepa- 
rate church after their national pattern, and till very 
recently it bore the national name. It is now simply 
the reformed church, which distinguishes it from nothing. 

In like manner, although as has been shown the papal 
church is everywhere the uncompromising enemy of re- 
ligious liberty, and wherever it rules shuts out Protes- 
tantism by the strong hand of power as in Spain, and in 
Austria and Italy, so long as it bore rule there ; yet she is 
hindered by no modesty and no conscientious scruple 
from availing herself of religious liberty wherever it exists, 
to plant and strengthen herself as much as possible by 
means of her emigrating population, and thus becomes 
an important sect in open antagonism with all others, 
in all countries whose circumstances invite the immigra- 
tion of laborers. 

In order to secure a perfectly distinct view of the 
matters presented in this chapter, it is necessary that 
the following things should be particularly noticed, even 
at the expense of falling into some repetition. 

i. The phenomena of sect as they are seen in the 

nineteenth century are not produced by religious liberty, 

but by the want of it. They result from the efforts of 

men to find freedom of expression, action and worship, 

16 



242 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

when restrained from the enjoyment of such freedom 
by a despotism exercised over the conscience. England 
and Scotland have not been made the hot-beds of sect 
for all Christendom by the religious liberty they have 
granted, half so much as by their unnatural and tyran- 
nical efforts to restrain it. It is perhaps generally 
supposed that our country is the principal sect-producer 
of the world, and the reason is supposed to be found 
in our unlimited religious freedom. These ideas are 
entirely erroneous. Our country is not half so prolific 
of sects as Britain, and the sects which it has produced 
have very largely resulted from the practical working 
of religious systems and religious ideas which are not 
at all of American origin, but have been transplanted 
to our soil from the hot-beds of Great Britain. Presby- 
terianism did not change its nature by a voyage across 
the Atlantic, and has shown almost as much power to 
generate new sects by its internal conflicts in this coun- 
try as in its native Scotland. The same is true of the 
American offshoots of other transatlantic churches. 
Our country is not in any eminent degree a nursery of 
sects. It it a vast open field upon which all the sects 
which have originated from the long struggle between 
religious liberty and spiritual despotism in Europe have 
been transplanted, and in which they have found room 
to grow. It is only this process of transplanting that 
has made ours the most sectarian country in the world. 
The history of this country affords no evidence that 
absolute religious liberty tends to the multiplication of 
sects, but much evidence to the contrary. 

2. Protestantism derived the germ from which all 
its sects have sprung from the papal church itself. It 
is a sect-producer not because it is Protestant, but 
because it is not Protestant enough. It still bears along 
with it the unmistakable lineaments of its papal parent- 



THE ORIGIN OF MODERN SECTS. 243 

age. Sect springs from the very same mistaken inter- 
pretation of the nature and powers of the church of 
Christ by which Hildebrand ruled Christendom, and 
made monarchs tremble on their thrones. The papal 
church is itself not only a sect, but the harlot mother 
of all sects, a sect indeed which in the Middle Ages 
crushed the human soul with such terrible vigor, as to 
render successful dissent impossible. She embraced 
within herself all sect. In an earlier age it was not so. 
The great schism between Eastern and Western churches 
which remains till this day was in all respects precisely 
analogous to the rise of religious sects under Protestant- 
ism. Rome and Constantinople each sought to exer- 
cise despotic power over the -consciences of all Christen- 
dom. Neither had the power to compel the other to 
submission, and therefore each became a sect which 
endures to this day, and will endure, till that good time 
coming when God shall "destroy them by the breath 
of his mouth and the brightness of his coming." In 
the same manner the separation of the other churches 
of the early ages from the rest of the Christian world 
was in all respects precisely analogous to the phenomena 
of modern sect. On the one hand there was dissent, 
on the other lack of power to compel submission. 

Dissent is not always restrained by temporal pains 
and penalties, but often only by ghostly terrors which 
superstition inspires. Such is the fact in respect to 
the papal church at the present time, in all countries of 
religious liberty. She can only retain her power over 
those who still believe that her hierarchy wields the 
spiritual powers of the world, and is able to affect the 
destiny of the human soul by intangible forces and 
after its departure from the body. It is through such 
beliefs that the papal hierarchy chiefly exerts its power, 
and preserves its unity in the nineteenth century. 



244 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

That by these forces which superstition supplies, she 
is able at present to hold in her spell a large portion 
of nominal Christendom cannot be denied ; but consid- 
ering how rapid is the progress of intelligence in the 
Christendom of the present, her hold on the future must 
certainly be considered precarious. 

3. It is a mistake to suppose, that mere differences 
of religious opinion must necessarily create religious 
sects. Those persons indeed who entertain contra- 
dictory views as to the nature and essence of Chris- 
tianity can neither worship nor act together. In such 
a case affirmation cannot harmonize with negation, for 
what one would build up the other would pull down. 
But the innumerable minor differences of opinion which 
prevail in all free communities neither necessitate the 
formation of rival religious sects, nor tend to create 
them. If you place a certain class of men in such rela- 
tions to all the rest of the world, that, according to 
universally received opinion, the rest of mankind can 
neither obey God nor worship him acceptably without 
their intervention, that class of men will dictate opinions 
to the rest of the world. If you construct a religious 
society and invest it with the sacredness which attaches 
to the church of Christ, and in that society you confer 
such powers on a corporation that God can only be 
successfully approached by its intervention or permis- 
sion, that corporation will impose its own creed on the 
society, in respect to minor as well as to essential mat- 
ters. In a church so constituted a new sect may be 
originated about the question what version of the Psalms 
shall be sung, as easily as about the existence of a per- 
sonal God or the divinity of Christ. But without the 
exercise of any such powers in the government of the 
church, such minor questions have little tendency to 
create sects. 



THE ORIGIN OF MODERN SECTS. 245 

It is not a necessary condition of the formation of a 
sect, that there should be any diversity of opinion at all. 
We have in this country at least one example of a sect 
of national dimensions, the existence of which does not 
in the least depend on any differences of opinion. I 
need only name the African Methodist Episcopal Church. 
Its separate existence depends entirely on social an- 
tipathies and aversions. It is not supposed that people 
of African and European origin are bound to a different 
destiny in a future life, but it is thought desirable to 
build up a good strong partition wall across the earthly 
manifestation of the kingdom of heaven, to secure for 
them separate accommodations so long as they are in 
the body. Qualifications for membership in a church 
of Christ are in this case not to be sought for in moral 
and spiritual lineaments, but in the features of the face 
and the texture of the hair. Sect does not spring from 
any necessity of human nature, but from constituting 
the church on principles utterly foreign to the concep- 
tion of the Founder of the kingdom of heaven. 



246 THE KEYS OF SECT. 



CHAPTER II. 

APOLOGIES FOR SECT. 

If the conclusions of the last chapter in respect to 
the origin and causes of the sects of modern Christen- 
dom are sound, it would seem a hopeless task to apolo- 
gize for their existence, and much more so to defend 
them as beneficial. We could hardly expect — wise 
men would not expect — to find sweet water gushing 
from so bitter a fountain. Nor is the present sectarian 
condition of the church of Christ sanctioned and ren- 
dered sacred by the approbation of the wise and good 
of former ages. They never have sanctioned it, but on 
the contrary have sought by all the means in their 
power to guard against and avoid it. 

And yet on few subjects have wise and good men in 
recent times labored so industriously and so honestly, 
as in their efforts to apologize for this condition of the 
church. The present generation of Christians did not 
create it. Consistently with those principles o£ church 
organization which have come down to us unquestioned 
from the fathers, we could not help it. It was a logical 
necessity which we could not avoid. We cannot now 
avoid it, without boldly and bravely calling those prin- 
ciples in question, and from doing that we shrink. 
Those principles were not called in question at the 
Reformation. There was, as has been shown, no appar- 
ent necessity for such an investigation. Those logical 



APOLOGIES FOR SECT. 247 

results of the organic principles on which the church 
had stood for ages, which we experience, and find to 
our sorrow to be inevitable, were not and could not 
then be foreseen. It was impossible, that those principles 
should be earnestly called in question, till they had 
borne their own proper fruit. Then and not till then 
such an investigation would take place. In our day 
they have borne and ripened their appropriate fruits, 
and nowhere in such abundance as in our own country. 
We are reduced to the necessity of accepting those 
fruits, and vindicating them as genuine products of the 
gospel of Christ, or of calling in question the organic 
principles of which they are the logical results. It is 
only when such alternatives are presented, that the 
aversion of men to calling in question long-established 
social ideas is overcome, and radical investigation takes 
place. The Protestant Reformation presented such an 
alternative to the reformers, and bravely they met it. 
Just such an alternative the phenomena of sect are 
presenting to the present generation. The numerous 
apologies which we meet on every hand for the exist- 
ence of sect, and the innumerable defences of it as a 
good and very desirable fruit of religious liberty, afford 
very striking proof, that such an alternative is really 
presented to us, and such a radical discussion of the 
subject inevitable. Before we proceed further it is 
necessary candidly to consider the more important of 
there apologies and defences. 

The first which seems to demand our attention is, the 
claim often put forward, that the diversity of sects which 
exists is a providential arrangement for accommodating 
the great variety of taste, feeling and culture which is 
found among Christian people. It is often claimed 
that men are naturally so different from each other, 
that they cannot easily and comfortably work together 



248 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

in the same ecclesiastical system. We often hear it 
asserted that some men are natural-born Episcopalians, 
having an innate liking for formal liturgies and stately 
ceremonies and ecclesiastical vestments, just as the 
water-fowl has for his own natural element ; that other 
men have an innate fitness for the various forms of 
worship which are found in Methodist, Baptist, Presby- 
terian, or Congregational churches; and that it is there- 
fore a very wise providential arrangement, that all these 
and many other diversities exist. To hear some men 
talk, you would think diversity of sects is as necessary 
as diversity of climate is to suit all the different orders 
of living beings which are found in the vegetable and 
animal kingdoms. 

I never listen to this sort of argument without the 
impression, that those who resort to it are quite con- 
scious of having a hard case to make out. If diversity 
of sects really sustains any such relation to human 
nature, it is marvelious, that the primitive church was 
not so constructed as to bring into being at once all 
the variety of sects which human nature renders so 
desirable. . What an easy thing it would have been for 
the apostles to have built up a Jewish church, cherish- 
ing all the rites of the Mosaic law, and right over 
against it a Gentile church in which all this ceremonial- 
ism was discarded ! The principle of sect being thus 
introduced under apostolic sanction, the number of 
sects might have been multiplied so rapidly that, even 
before the death of the last of the apostles, this great 
want of human nature might have been as fully pro- 
vided for as it is in our times. But it is evident the 
apostles had never seen this subject in the light of our 
modern experience. Nothing did they resist with 
greater earnestness than any tendency to division 
among the disciples, even in spirit, and still more in 



APOLOGIES FOR SECT. 249 

form and external organization. No matter how strong 
the natural repulsion was between Jews and Gentiles, 
or how different their tastes, manners and customs, 
the apostles insisted on bringing them together in the 
same church, and on accustoming them in that intimate 
relation to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of 
peace. This is not wisdom according to the standard 
of the nineteenth century, but it is apostolic wisdom ; 
perhaps it will yet be discovered even in these modern 
times, that it is the wisdom of God. 

The papal church, notwithstanding the rigor of its 
spiritual despotism, affords a very striking illustration 
of the manner in which a world-wide religious body, 
embracing within its bosom every variety of nationality, 
thought, taste, culture, may yet furnish ample scope for 
the exercise of every human talent and the gratification 
of every taste, without in the least impairing its unity 
or endangering its tranquillity. She has great enter- 
prises for the bold, the strong, the restless ; and quiet 
walks and tranquil lives for the thoughtful and contem- 
plative. She has full employment for the imagination 
in poetry and art, and for the admirers of a splendid 
ceremonial and a venerable liturgy, in her cathedral 
worship. How much more would this be "true, if the 
whole multitude of disciples in all lands and in every 
variety of taste and culture were firmly bound together 
according to the -conception of the Founder, only by 
moral and spiritual ties, in the full enjoyment of the 
freedom wherewith Christ maketh his people free ! The 
world-wide unity of the papal church cannot, as experi- 
ence abundantly demonstrates, be maintained, without 
imposing the most vigorous restraints on the exercise 
of the intellect, in all things pertaining to God. But 
in the Holy Catholic Church, every human faculty will 
be quickened, and there will be abundant scope for the 



250 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

exercise of every talent, and the gratification of every 
taste consistent with virtue. An all-pervading vital 
force will quicken the entire body of the faithful into 
vigorous and healthful activity, and earnest men will 
not fail to devise and employ all desirable mode's of 
manifesting the spirit of devotion. Living activity will 
be everywhere with all its variety, and dead uniformity 
nowhere. Into such a church of God, to introduce 
diversity of sects would only be to mar and to degrade. 
Diversities of sect are not necessary or fitted to 
accommodate any natural diversities of character ; but 
they do tend to create and perpetuate unnatural pecul- 
iarities of character in the different classes of society, 
which are inconsistent with the health and soundness 
of the body politic. Every one of the religious sects 
which exists at the present time tends to separate and 
isolate its members from the rest of the community, 
and to produce a narrowness of thought and affection, 
which is quite inconsistent with the growth of a per- 
fected civilization. In many cases you may know what 
sect a man is of almost as soon as he begins to speak. 
Too many of us always carry with us the unmistakable 
badjje of the isolation in which we live. Each sect 
tends to be a community within itself, building up and 
maintaining a little civilization of its own, and repelling 
many beneficent influences which it might derive from 
truly cosmopolitan relations with the rest of mankind. 
In our own country, it is deplorable to notice how much 
the breadth and completeness of our national character 
are impaired by this littleness which sect produces. It 
is as though we were not the people of one great con- 
tinental nation, but separate tribes cut off from commu- 
nication with each other by impassable natural barriers. 
Many persons will not accept this view of the case as 
true, because to them the standard of their own sect is 



APOLOGIES FOR SECT. 25 I 

accepted as the standard of perfection. But thougthful, 
candid men will sorrowfully recognize this picture as 
true to life. It is easy to find American Methodists or 
American Presbyterians or American Episcopalians, 
but hard to find American Christians. 

In England the case is if possible still worse. 
There each sect tends to find the sphere of its activity 
in some one of the numerous ranks into which English 
society is permanently divided, and thus to separate 
that rank from the rest of the community by religious 
as well as by social boundaries. You might almost 
say that each rank has its church, as each caste in 
India has its own religious rites. To this however 
there is one sad exception. In the established church, 
the highest and the lowest ranks meet together, but 
without the presence of those intermediate social grades 
which are the proper natural links of connection between 
them. Thus, in the case of the two extremes of society, 
their being brought together in the same worshipping 
assemblies under the most unnatural conditions tends 
to promote that domination of the great, and that cring- 
ing servility of the lowly, the sight of which so often 
makes us sad in England. 

I must therefore conclude that this apology for sect 
is quite fallacious ; that the reason which sustains it is 
preposterous, putting cause for effect and effect for 
cause ; not affording necessary accomodation for natural 
diversities, but creating those which are unnatural and 
morbid, and inconsistent with the completeness and 
unity of Christian civilization. 

Another apology for sect which is often asserted with 
great complacency and assurance is, that the existence 
of such diversities quickens thought, encourages dis- 
cussion, and promotes progress in religious knowledge. 
It is confidently affirmed, that without it religious society 



252 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

would become dead and stagnant; and the argument is 
generally illustrated by the supposed analogy of a pool 
of water agitated by no breezes, and stirred by no cur- 
rents. The argument and the figure by which it is 
illustrated are alike fanciful and groundless. Pure 
water will not stagnate, though motionless ; neither 
does pure society require the agitation of partisan con- 
troversy, to preserve its intellectual vigor and activity. 
Those who resort to this mode of arguing, as an apology 
for the existing diversities of sect, always fall into 
bewildering confusion of thought. They first bewilder 
themselves, then their followers. They confound to- 
gether two things which have already been shown to be 
so distinct, that the existence of one of them does not 
at all imply the existence of the other. Diversity of 
religious opinion does not at all imply diversity of sect. 
Give us that intellectual liberty in the church, which is 
so much of the essence of Christianity that it cannot 
produce its appropriate results without it, and the 
widest diversity of opinions about everything except 
the truth of Christianity itself will exist, without any 
tendency to divide the Christian body into as many 
sects as there are differing shades of religious opinion. 
To assume that this is not true, is to assume that there 
can be absolutely no intellectual liberty in a Christian 
church. It has all along been not only admitted, but 
affirmed, that membership in the church of Christ implies 
faith in those great facts on which Jesus Christ and 
the apostles founded Christianity and the Christian 
church. It has been shown in the progress of this work 
that there is no difficulty at all in knowing what those 
matters of fact are ; and it is absurd for any one who 
rejects them to claim or desire to be recognized as a 
Christian. We do not judge them, we do not abridge 
their intellectual liberty, or even their religious liberty. 



APOLOGIES FOR SECT. 253 

The universe is large enough both for them and for us. 
We only affirm that one cannot be a Christian disciple 
and yet deny the fundamental facts of Christianity. 
He must go his own way, make his own election, and 
run the risk of attempting to work out the problem of 
destiny without Christianity. But within those limits, 
the freedom of Christ is wide enough to accommodate 
all the differences of opinion which can result from the 
diversities of men's innocent tastes, and the limitations 
of the human intellect. 

The existence of such differences of opinion not only 
does not imply diversity of sects, but it operates on 
religious society far more healthfully and beneficently 
without sectarian divisions than with them. Religious 
controversies respecting matters in regard to which the 
disputants are already organized into rival sects, and 
each is contending, not only for his party, but for his 
sacred Christian church, cannot be healthful, or have 
much tendency to promote Christian truth. It is 
scarcely possible that such disputants should be under 
the simple influence of the love of truth. They are not 
only contending for victory, but for the defence of their 
holy city, of the sacred ark of God. Each is surrounded 
by a host of followers whose only solicitude is that 
their party, their church may be successfully defended. 
How little chance that truth can gain anything from 
such a conflict ! Lookers-on are painfully impressed 
by the spectacle. It seems to them only a battle-field, 
an outbreak of partisanship, a struggle for the pre- 
eminence. Both parties seem to have lost the peaceful 
and loving spirit of the Master, and to be uselessly dis- 
turbing the peace of the community. In the result 
each party adheres to his belief with feelings embittered 
and alienated toward each other, and Christianity itself 
suffers a degradation in the estimation of the commu- 



254 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

nity. There is no thoughtful man among us who will 
not recognize this picture as true to life. If experience 
teaches us anything in this matter, it is that diversity of 
sects does not tend to healthful and useful religious 
discussion. Everybody knows this. 

It is for this reason that, in those portions of Christen- 
dom where sects are most multiplied, there is a strong- 
tendency to discountenance all public discussion of the 
matters about which different sects are at variance with 
each other. It is so apt to result in exciting a conten- 
tious and unchristian spirit, that the conclusion is at 
last reached, that all such discussion is essentially 
uncharitable and evil, and ought to be frowned upon 
by all good men. For the most part it is so frowned 
upon. The result is that a truce is tacitly entered into 
between the different religious sects, to abstain from 
all public discussion of the subject matter which divides 
them. This truce proceeds upon the assumption, that 
our present sectarian divisions are an unavoidable 
result of that religious liberty to which we all mean to 
adhere, and must therefore be perpetual. The bounda- 
ries of doctrine and polity which separate the different 
sects from each other are already distinctly drawn, and 
it is presumed they are to be permanent. The attempt 
to shake or overthrow any of these established land- 
marks is thought to be a gratuitous disturbance of the 
tranquillity of the community, and an' uncharitable vio- 
lation of the tacit treaty of peace which exists between 
these high powers, that have parcelled out among them- 
selves and assume to govern all Christendom. 

It must not be supposed however that the existence 
of such a truce implies any real cessation of the conflict 
between them. He who thinks so takes a very super- 
ficial view of the subject. Each sect assumes the neces- 
sity, not only of perpetuating its existence, but of 



APOLOGIES FOR SECT. 255 

extending its influence. Public controversy is laid 
aside as an impracticable weapon, but the work of 
proselytism goes on with unresting activity in innumer- 
able forms which are less obtrusive, and less open to 
scandal than public controversy, but which perhaps 
are not less efficient or less indicative of the perpetual 
unrest with which the community is afflicted. It is by 
no means my purpose to draw aside the thin veil that 
covers this ceaseless activity of the spirit of sectarian 
proselytism from the public gaze ; but its existence is 
as certain as it is sad. By such means the multiplica- 
tion of sects among us, so far from tending to intel- 
lectual activity and healthy freedom of discussion, is 
withdrawing all the matters about which sects are 
divided from any discussion whatsoever, and dooming the 
public mind to a very unhealthy stagnation in respect 
to them. It is equivalent to assuming that, when any 
opinion has become the settled boundary line between 
religious sects, it never can be subjected any more to 
the application of those unerring tests by which the 
human mind discriminates truth from falsehood ; that 
along that boundary line there must perpetually exist 
a dim twilight of the soul, under which some men will 
confidently affirm, and others will as confidently deny, 
without the possibility of determining who is right and 
who is wrong. 

The influence of this tacit truce in discountenancing 
the freedom of discussion is much more extensive than 
those who originated it intended. They meant it to 
apply only to the matters which divide those sects 
which are after all recognized as belonging to the great 
household of faith, but its influence can by no means 
be confined within those limits. If it is agreed, that the 
subjects which divide such sects are exempted from all 
public controversy, in the interest of Christian charity, 



256 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

the world will see no reason why the exemption should 
not extend much more widely. The world will regard 
it as just as uncharitable for us to assail the doctrines 
of a sect that differs from us most fundamentally, as 
those of one that differs from us only on matters not 
deemed fundamental to Christian faith and character. 
It has long been true in this country, that no Protestant 
can freely expose the errors and superstitions of the 
papal church, especially from the pulpit, without incur- 
ring the charge of intolerance, bigotry and uncharitable- 
ness. Religious controversy itself has been placed 
under the ban, as in its own nature uncharitable. 
When once any religious opinion has organized itself 
into a sect, it is thought to have acquired a sacredness, 
which, in the name of Christian charity, and in the 
interest of the tranquillity of the community, defends 
it from any open assault. We have come into the con- 
dition in which Rome was when she had extended her 
conquests from the British Isles to the Euphrates, and 
had transferred to Rome the divinities of all the coun- 
tries she had conquerred. People of every nationality 
might worship their own divinities, but must respect- 
fully tolerate the worship of every other. In this way 
only could religious conflict be avoided. The chief 
reason why Christianity was persecuted was, that from 
its very nature it could accept of no such truce. It is 
either a universal religion or no religion at all. It is, 
like all other systems which claim to be the truth, in its 
own nature exclusive. 

There can be no greater mistake than to imagine, 
that the multiplicity of sects tends to healthful intel- 
lectual excitement, and such progress in freedom of 
discussion as insures the discovery of truth. Its ten- 
dency is in the very opposite direction, and the strength 
of that tendency is quite heart-sickening. If these 



APOLOGIES FOR SECT. 



2 57 



pages ever come to the public eye, the reception they 
will meet in many quarters will amply illustrate the 
truth of what I am saying. Many persons will turn 
from their perusal with a feeling of strong disgust and 
disapprobation at the freedom with which I have ex- 
pressed myself on all the religious questions which lie 
in my path, however hedged around by these sanctities 
which are supposed to protect the peculiar doctrines of 
sects long held sacred from being freely handled in the 
open arena of religious discussion. I have undertaken 
the work only from a profound conviction, that the 
church is wandering in the wilderness, and can only 
find her way out into those regions of peace and 
liberty, where the church of the future shall find rest, 
by the utmost freedom of utterance in reference to all 
the questions which relate to the constitution of the 
church as its divine Founder conceived of it. The whole 
truth respecting this matter must be uttered, whether 
men will hear or whether they will forbear. 

Another apology for the existing multiplication of 
sects is perhaps more frequently insisted on than 
either of those thus far examined. It is claimed that the 
rivalries of sect stimulate people to a much greater 
degree of religious activity than would exist without 
them. It is said that if, in a community in which all 
Christian people are embraced in the same religious 
organization, a division takes place, by which the same 
community becomes two sects, two churches instead of 
one, both churches are likely to be better supported 
than the one was before ; and that thus obviously the 
amount of religious activity in the whole community 
will* have been greatly increased. Nothing can be 
more deceptive than this conclusion from the premises. 
There may indeed be cases in which the existing church 
did not adequately provide for supplying the social 
17 



250 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

religious wants of the community. There may have 
been a necessity that church sittings should have been 
multiplied, that church accommodations should be 
brought more within the reach of portions of the popu- 
lation, and that therefore two church edifices could 
accommodate the people much better than one, or the 
congregation may have become so large that one house 
cannot conveniently contain it. In such cases as these, 
and probably in others which might be supposed, a 
Christian community may with great advantage consti- 
tute two local churches where before there was but one, 
by mutual agreement for the benefit of the common 
cause ; and when such an arrangement has been entered 
into, it may often prove true that the larger religious 
enterprise that has been undertaken may greatly stimu- 
late religious activity, so that two churches will be bet- 
ter sustained than one was before. It is because men 
have a more adequate sense of the religious wants of 
the community, and therefore make greater efforts to 
supply them. 

There is room however for very grave doubt whether 
like beneficent results could have been produced in 
that community by drawing through it the boundary 
line of two distinct sects. The influence of such a 
division certainly differs very widely from that of the 
fraternal division already supposed. The aims of the 
Christian religion are always moral and spiritual, not 
material and external. It seeks not the doing of cer- 
tain external acts from whatever motive, but the forma- 
tion of such principles and purposes as will do all right 
things from the impulse of love to God and man. The 
division of the community supposed will indeed increase 
the number of church sittings, and make two congrega- 
tions where there was but one before, and furnish two 
places of public worship instead of one, and greatly 



APOLOGIES FOR SECT. 259 

increase the religious activity of the community in order 
to accomplish these things. In these respects the result 
is the same in the two cases. But how different the 
motives by which men are stimulated to the doing of 
these things ! He who has ever seen the process of 
drawing a line of sect through a community, and mak- 
ing two where there was but one before, knows the 
difference between these two cases, and never can forget 
it. And there are portions of our country, where one 
cannot have lived long, without witnessing this process, 
and having had such experience from it, as will lead 
him to pray that he may never witness it again. He 
will know ever afterwards, that drawing a line of sect 
through a community before united, is not the same as 
a fraternal agreement to organize two Christian churches, 
because it is seen that such a step is necessary to the 
adequate supply of the religious wants of the community. 
Both may quicken activity, but in one case it is the 
activity of sect, in the other it is the activity of love to 
Christ and the brethren. In one of these cases, one is 
likely to encounter a chilling atmosphere of rivalry, 
ambition and bitterness, in the other an atmosphere 
of warm and genial and loving zeal for Christ and the 
souls of men. It is a sad thing to substitute the former 
of these for the latter. Such a substitution is made 
with all its sorrowful consequences, whenever the num- 
ber of congregations in a given community is multiplied 
by the antagonisms of sect, rather than by fraternal 
consultation for the common well-being. 

This will be true when men are stimulated by secta- 
rian rivalries to do the very same things to the doing 
of which they ought to have been instigated by Chris- 
tian love. But he is deplorably deceived who thinks, 
that the dividing up of a religious community by draw- 
ing sectarian lines, will incite men to do the same 



260 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

things and only the same things which they ought to 
do from love to Christ. In every case in which the 
experiment is made, the ambition of sectarian aggran- 
dizement will assert itself, and have great influence in 
practice ; and he who knows anything about it by expe- 
rience, knows that it is a very unscrupulous spirit, — just 
as unscrupulous as any other selfish ambition. Its nature 
is to inquire, not what the religious welfare of the commu- 
nity requires, but what the aggrandizement of my sect 
requires, and to act accordingly. An individual or a com- 
munity that acts under the influence of that motive seems 
to be very zealous for God ; but it is a very mistaken 
and misguided zeal, which often stimulates to do many 
things which the religious welfare of the community 
does not require, and many things which ought not to 
be done at all. Its tendency is to surround a church 
with costly attractions, which do not promote its real 
usefulness, and thus to bring upon a Christian people 
heavy burdens and grievous to be borne, drive many 
from the church who are unable to bear their share in 
its expenses, and to employ innumerable social influ- 
ences in the interest of sect, which ought to be employed 
only in a spirit of universal fraternity and good-will to 
men. These are general statements, but all who have 
much experience of sect will easily illustrate them to 
their own minds by innumerable examples. 

Sect may divide a community into two congregations 
where two congregations ou^ht to exist, and thus do 
very badly what in due time would have been very 
happily and usefully done in the spirit of Christ, with- 
out its intervention. Even in that case, the mischief 
which it does and perpetuates is great and lasting. 
But it is far more likely to make two congregations of 
one, where such a division can be productive of nothing 
but evil, where it not only, as in the case before sup- 



APOLOGIES FOR SECT. 261 

posed, plants the seeds cf mutual alienation and rivalry 
for the long future, but produces weakness where there 
ought to be strength, and division of resources where 
there ought to be concentration, and makes upon the 
mind of all thoughtful men the impression that, if these 
p2ople really did love Christ better than sect, they would 
not persist in maintaining two churches where, for all the 
purposes of religious efficiency, one would be a great 
deal better. Over vast districts of our country, cases 
of this description are multiplied, till in one who con- 
siders them rightly they produce a sickness of heart 
which words cannot describe. 

It is vain to tell us, that the multiplication of sects 
stimulates to greater religious activity, when we know 
that villages and towns in our - own country can be 
counted by hundreds, in which from four to six Protes- 
tant sects are maintaining a sickly and feeble existence, 
scarcely able, by the utmost possible effort and self- 
denial, to support themselves from year to year without 
any efficiency or aggressive power, where, but for our 
multiplication of sects, one church of Christ would be 
sustained and exert its mighty influence over the whole 
community. In this exceedingly numerous class of 
cases, the result is, that social religious activity is ren- 
dered useless, and any real efficiency of the church 
impossible. In larger towns, by very extraordinary 
effort, churches of the various names are sustained by 
pecuniary sacrifices which are unnecessary and exhaust- 
ing. It would not be difficult to find examples of towns 
containing from ten to fifteen thousand inhabitants, in 
which the social worship of God costs not less than six 
or seven dollars to each inhabitant, old and young ; and 
that although scarcely more than one half the people 
are regular attendants of any church, or contribute any- 
thing to the support of public worship. In such com- 



2 52 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

munities, it is apt to be thought, that the support of 
Christian institutions is very expensive. It is not 
Christianity, but sect, that is expensive. This is the 
way in which sect stimulates to greater religious 
activity. 

If we look in another quarter, we shall be called to 
contemplate facts still more saddening and alarming. 
In smaller villages and in the open country, the case 
is infinitely worse. Undoubtedly the first effect of sect 
applied to any community is to stimulate to a certain 
kind of activity, which however at the very best is not 
very religious. If you go on multiplying sects, you will 
for a time increase that activity by increasing the bur- 
dens which Christian people are compelled to bear. 
But if this process is carried on in a community of 
limited and scattered population and small resources, 
a point is soon reached, at which all the wealth of the 
community is only adequate to the expense of sustain- 
ing one Christian congregation, and the effect of divid- 
ing that community into several sects will be, that no 
one sect will be strong enough, by the utmost activity 
and liberality, to sustain the public worship of God 
with any regularity and efficiency. That which is seen 
to be impossible will not be attempted. The house of 
God will lie waste. In this manner large districts and 
multitudinous populations of our country are, by the 
influence of sect, utterly destitute of any adequate and 
satisfactory provision for the instruction and spiritual 
edification of the people. Almost all religious activity is 
given up, because it is seen to be useless and hopeless. 
This is sect in the full development of its influence. 

I am not unaware that these pages may fall into the 
hands of persons who honestly think, that one of the 
great religious bodies of our country, the Methodist 
Episcopal Church, has provided the means of remedy- 



APOLOGIES FOR SECT. 263 

ing the evils I allude to. In another chapter I purpose 
to examine that remedy, and to show its utter inade- 
quacy, or rather to show that, instead of being a remedy, 
it intensifies the evil. 

I have now completed the examination of the apolo- 
gies which are usually made for the multiplication of 
sects. I trust it has been made to appear, that they 
can only seem to be successful vindications of it when 
viewed in the most hasty and superficial manner, and 
that when examined analytically and thoroughly, and 
traced to their more remote and permanent conse- 
quences, it will be found that diversities of sect are 
only mischievous, in the very respects in which it is 
claimed by their apologists that their influence is bene- 
ficial. It is easy to show that the good which is claimed 
to result from them is only apparent, and that the evils 
are great and permanent. The fathers of the Reforma- 
tion were not mistaken in respect to the evils which 
they dreaded from opening the flood-gates of sect, 
though they were mistaken in trying to close those 
flood-gates by restraining the Lord's people in respect 
to the exercise of religious liberty. No. man would ever 
think of apologizing for the present factious condition 
of Christianity in the world, unless he had first been 
made to believe that it is an inevitable result of reli°-- 
ious liberty, and that it cannot be avoided in the future, 
except by remanding the human mind to the prison- 
house of spiritual despotism. It is not wonderful that 
men who sincerely love Christianity and religious lib- 
erty, and confidently believe that they cannot coexist 
in the world without producing all the phenomena of 
sect as we see them, should wish to apologize for sect, 
and find some good in it if possible. The reader knows 
by this time that I feel no such necessity of defend- 
ing it. 



264 THE KEYS OF SECT. 



CHAPTER III. 

SECT ANTICHRISTIAN. 

It is commonly assumed, that the only objection 
which can be urged against the sectarian condition of 
Christendom is to be found in the evil consequences 
produced, in the weakness, alienation, and strife occa- 
sioned by it, and that if any one of our sects could by 
itself occupy the whole field, and thus the division of 
the Christian host be avoided, all would be well. Per- 
haps we should all be taken by surprise by being credi- 
bly informed, what portion of the Christian community 
confidently entertain the opinion, that nothing else so 
good could happen to the Christian world, as that all 
other sects except their own should be abandoned, and 
their own become universal. It is worth our while 
perhaps to inquire whether this is really so. May we 
not safely conclude, that if there is one of the Christian 
bodies which now divide the religious world, in respect 
to which that assumption would be true, that one body 
will be sure to make its profiting to appear, and at no 
distant clay to become universal ? Is it not in a high 
degree probable, that the only reason why no one of the 
religious bodies of the time seems to have any prospect 
of attaining to such a destiny is to be found in the fact, 
that all are more or less vitiated by a common anti- 
christian principle? If this should prove to be true, 
it would certainly be a matter of very serious concern- 
ment to the whole Christian world. 



SECT ANTICHRISTIAN. 265 

It has already been shown, l that the principle that 
every individual owes direct allegiance to God without 
the possibility of any rightful human intervention, is 
fundamental to the religion of the Bible from the 
beginning till now. Religious liberty is the inalienable 
birthright of every being made in the image of God. 
Never was this principle so abundantly and strikingly 
affirmed, as in the coming of the Messiah, and the 
establishment of Christianity in the world. Jesus as- 
serted his claim as the Messiah of God through no 
earthly or human authority, but directly to the individual 
intellect and conscience. It is utterly incredible that, 
having made his own appeal to the individual conscience 
as he did, he should ever have established any authority 
or institution in his kingdom, which should impair or 
interfere with such an appeal in any future age. 

It is equally certain that the power of the keys, as 
understood for so many ages, and made the funda- 
mental principle of all church government, does consti- 
tute a human authority to stand between the individual 
conscience and God. It does require of the individual 
disciple the performance of certain acts of worship 
which he cannot perform without the intervention of a 
human authority. The men intrusted with that au- 
thority are restrained by no accurate definition and 
limitation of their powers, to forbid their imposing con- 
ditions under which alone men may be admitted to the 
performance of those acts of worship, which conditions 
are incompatible with the rights of individual conscience. 
That power of the keys has been so used as to interfere 
in this manner with direct individual allegiance to God, 
in every age since that of the apostles, and in every 
sect of Christendom that has asserted and exercised it. 

1 Chap. II., Tart I. 



266 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

It has never failed to be an instrument of spiritual des- 
potism. It is such in its own nature. In what sect of 
Christian history has not the assumed right to admit 
men to the Lord's Supper and exclude them from it, 
been employed as the means of enforcing acquiescence 
in statements of doctrine, which no man in his senses 
regards as essential, either to Christian faith or morals, 
and submission to practices and customs which have 
no sanction in the law of Christ ? It is an instrument 
always furbished and ready for use. If the pope thinks 
freemasonry an evil institution, he threatens all good 
Catholics connected with it with excommunication, 
unless they renounce it. The same weapon is equally 
ready for use in the hands of a Congregational church, 
a Presbyterian judicatory, a Methodist conference, or 
an Anglican convocation. Let it not be supposed, 
from my using this illustration, that I have any desire 
to protect freemasonry from censure. But an assump- 
tion of church power can as easily be employed against 
a good institution as against a bad one, against right- 
eousness as against iniquity. The assumption on the 
part of the church or clergy of the right to dictate con- 
ditions of their own devising, on compliance with which 
alone individual disciples may be permitted to come 
near to Christ in baptism and the Lord's Supper, is a 
violation of the rights of individual conscience. This 
is sect. It is the seed of all sect, and it is essentially 
antichristian. 

When therefore the church in the ages that followed 
that of the apostles placed the keeping of baptism 
and the Lord's Supper in the hands of a clerical 
and priestly corporation, it did more than introduce a 
principle which must work mischief in the future. It 
admitted an antichristian element which must produce 
present disastrous effects whenever acted upon. It 



SECT ANTICHRISTrAN. 267 

must greatly change the relation of the individual mem- 
ber to the church and its government, and to the rites 
of Christian worship. The custom still prevails in some 
churches, that before each observance of the Lord's 
Supper each communicant must apply to the officers of 
the church for a token, without the presentation of 
which he will be denied a seat at the table. If the 
church officers think they have any reason for object- 
ing to anything in his life, they will withhold the token, 
and deprive him of participation. How different the 
spirit of such an observance of the Lord's Supper from 
that of the original institution, and from the observance 
of it in the apostolic churches ! The element of free- 
dom and spontaneity is gone. The private communi- 
cant is under bondage, the church officer exercises an 
authority which cannot but be dangerous. No one 
deeply imbued with the spirit of apostolic times can 
fail to feel, that it has no sanction there, and yet the 
custom of giving tokens and requiring their presentation 
at the table is only a consistent acting out of the power 
of the keys, wherever it is assumed and exercised. It 
is the end of spiritual liberty in the church of God. 

No right-minded Protestant fails to regard the con- 
fessional, as it is employed in the papal church, with 
intense moral disapprobation. Yet no man can point 
out any difference in principle between the confessional 
and the use of tokens as it probably still exists, cer- 
tainly as it has existed within my personal recollection 
in many Presbyterian churches. It is true indeed, that 
the view entertained in the papal church of the conse- 
quences of exclusion from the Lord's Supper is not 
the same as that which is maintained in the Presbyte- 
rian church. For this reason we are apt to be much 
more shocked at the practices of the confessional than 
by the use which a Presbyterian church session makes 



268 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

of the power of the keys, in the case of which I am 
speaking. But both employ the same instrument of 
church power. Both exercise a restraint on the liber- 
ties of conscience by means of an asserted guardian- 
ship of this Christian rite. If one can be defended on 
scriptural principles, so can the other. The very same 
argument which will vindicate the one is equally good 
to vindicate the other. If the church really has the 
power of the keys, the more thoroughly and stringently 
she uses it, the more faithful she is to her divine Master. 
On the other hand, the use of tokens in the Presby- 
terian church is only a systematic and stringent exercise 
of a power which every Presbyterian church session 
claims and professes to exercise. If that claim of 
power really rests on scriptural authority, no valid 
objection can be made to the use of the token. No 
reason can be given why any Congregational church 
claiming the same ecclesiastical power should not use 
tokens or even the confessional. The same principle 
pervades the whole, applied more or less stringently. 
That principle is the nucleus of all sect. 

The assertion and exercise of such a power as this 
always tends, in proportion to the degree in which it is 
exercised, to cultivate a selfish and despotic spirit, and 
to fill the soul with the lust of dominion. It has been 
the evil genius of the Christian church from the early 
ages to the present time. The tendency of multiplied 
sects to destroy the harmony of the Christian brother- 
hood does not depend alone on their multiplicity, but 
much more on the virulence of this element, with which 
for the most part they are infected. "Come see my 
zeal for the Lord ! " cries the ardent sectarian. But what 
he takes to be zeal for the Lord is more frequently the 
intensely excited lust of power, generated in his heart by 
that very vicious element which has just been pointed 



SECT ANTICHRISTIAN. 269 

out. The aspects of religious society around us afford 
illustrations of the truth of this as sad as they are nu- 
merous. In order to make the point perfectly plain, it is 
necessary to consider some of them more particularly. 

A religious community, otherwise united and harmo- 
nious, becomes divided in opinion in respect to the mode 
in which it is most proper that water should be applied 
in the rite of baptism. Some think that the rite essen- 
tially consists in the application of water as an emblem 
of religious purification, and that therefore it is imma- 
terial in what manner the water is applied. They can 
certainly allege cases, in some of which the application 
seems to have been made in one way, and in some in 
another. Others adhere closely to what seems to have 
been the primary meaning of the word " baptize " in 
the Greek language, and therefore maintain, that the 
rite is essentially immersion, and that no other applica- 
tion of water can be baptism. In an ordinary and 
healthful condition of religious society, such a diversity 
of opinion could produce no serious consequences. The 
solution which Christian freedom would dictate is per- 
fectly easy and natural. Let each be fully persuaded 
in his own mind, and use that method which he thinks 
to be right. It is as important as any one thinks it, 
that each individual should implicitly and exactly obey 
the Master as he understands him, but not at all impor- 
tant, that every brother in the church should understand 
him alike and make use of the same method. If it 
should occur to any one, that the pastor of the church 
might be hindered by conscientious scruples from 
exhibiting the rite of baptism in any other than his own 
mode, the answer is easy. We have only to divest our 
minds of the unscriptural idea, that the rite of baptism 
can only be performed by persons possessing clerical 
powers derived from the laying on of hands. 



270 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

How then does it happen, that such a division of 
opinion arising in a Christian community does almost 
invariably divide it into two sects, whatever disastrous 
consequences may come from such a division ? To this 
question but one answer can be returned. It is assumed 
that the Master has made the church in its organic and 
corporate capacity the guardian and dispenser of the 
Lord's Supper, and required it so to guard the sanctity 
of that rite, as to admit to it only those who believe all 
Christian doctrine, and obey all Christian precepts : and 
has imposed on the church itself the duty of judging 
for every individual disciple what are Christian doc- 
trines and Christian precepts. Let this assumption be 
accepted in the community in question as undoubtedly 
sound and true, and the division will be inevitable, no 
matter what evil consequences may be foreseen as likely 
to come of it. If the existing church enforces one of 
these methods of performing the rite of baptism to the 
exclusion of the other, or refuses to enforce that method 
which one party regards as indispensable to the rite, 
a new church will certainly be formed, for the purpose 
of employing the Lord's Supper as a means of enfor- 
cing the views of the dissatisfied party, and it will be 
done in a spirit of entire recklessness of consequences. 
Men will assume that the Master requires it, and must 
be obeyed whatever consequences may follow. 

What it is necessary here particularly to observe is, 
not that the principle assumed will necessarily produce 
division, but that it is itself essentially antichristian, 
and at variance with that religious liberty which is as 
fundamental to Christianity as the Messiahship of 
Jesus ; for the Messiahship of Jesus could never have 
been manifested to the world without it. The cause 
of this division is the assumption that the church in its 
corporate capacity is authorized and required to exer- 



SECT ANTICIIRISTIAN. 27 I 

cise lordship over the individual conscience, and by the 
power of the keys exclude from the Supper of the Lord 
all who do not accept its interpretations of Christian 
doctrine and duty. This is the very despotic assump- 
tion by which Hildebrand brought the Emperor of 
Germany to his feet, clothed in sackcloth. It is the 
virulent, unscrupulous, despotic, antichristian element 
which characterizes sect wherever found. It matters 
comparatively little whether it produces a multiplication 
of sects, or succeeds in suppressing all dissent. The 
principle itself is evil, only evil and that continually. 

It may be said that I have selected an extreme case, 
that few sects adopt the principle of exclusive com- 
munion as many immersionists do, and that the argu- 
ment will not hold when the sects adopt mutual inter- 
communion. The answer is, that I am unable to 
perceive that mutual intercommunion affects in any 
way the argument. Open communion as it is called 
is certainly a step in the right direction. It is a con- 
cession of the spirit of sect to the demands of Chris- 
tian fraternity. But it is only a partial concession, 
not the relinquishment of the principle itself. It still 
remains true, that each sect depends for its separate 
existence on the assumption, that no disciple can gain 
admission to the Lord's Supper otherwise than through 
a gate of which the church in her corporate capacity 
has the key. Each sect claims that it has that key of 
Peter, and is bound to open and shut only as men 
comply, or refuse to comply with her interpretations of 
all Christian doctrine and duty. This is the theoretic 
basis still on which each sect rests. But theory and 
practice can seldom be entirely coincident. Consider- 
ing the rough and impracticable materials with which 
in this world we have to deal, something of theory 
must be conceded in practice. It is so in this case. 



272 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

Few men can be so blinded by their sectarian zeal as 
not to perceive, that as good Christians can be found in 
other sects as in their own, and that the Lord's Supper 
was intended by the Master and Saviour of us all to 
be a common badge of all his disciples, by the use of 
which they should manifest to all the world their com- 
mon relation to him, and their social oneness with each 
other. Exclusive communion within a sect, which is 
acknowledged to be only a very small portion of the 
whole multitude of the disciples, becomes horribly dis- 
cordant with a sense of Christian fitness and fraternity. 
What shall be clone ? The foundations of our sect .we 
cannot abandon, neither will other sects abandon theirs. 
But we will concede something to the necessities of the 
case. We cannot deny that the people who compose 
other sects are disciples as well as we. Something is 
due to the comity of sects. To such comity therefore 
we must make some concession. We do not give up 
our own principles. We will not -surrender the keys. 
We will initiate to the Lord's Supper none who do not 
square to all our standards. But we will invite to 
"occasional communion" with us any who have been 
initiated according to the standards of other bodies, 
regarded by us as Christian. By making this conces- 
sion, we relinquish nothing of the stringency of our 
government over our own members. In relation to 
them, we hold the keys as firmly as ever. We relim 
quish nothing of the distinctness of our church from all 
others, and just as before continue to wield Peter's 
keys to enforce our ideas of doctrine and duty. Open 
communion is indeed inconsistent with the fundamental 
principle of sect ; but it is only a partial concession to 
the demands of Christian comity, while the original 
root from which sect grows remains as vigorous as 
ever. 



SECT ANTICHRISTIAN. 273 

Many of us are greatly shocked at exclusive com- 
munion ; I am one of the number. It jars harshly 
upon that estimate which devout minds spontaneously 
form of the normal relations of the disciples of Christ 
to each other. They all sustain a common relation to 
him and to one another, and why should they not unite 
most lovingly and joyfully in commemorating his death 
for our sins ? Why should one company of disciples 
exclude another from participating in this celebration ? 
But after all, does not the shock come in at the wrong 
place ? If the Master has appointed that his church 
shall, in its corporate capacity, use the privilege of 
celebrating the Supper as a means of compelling all 
individual disciples to conform to her views of truth 
and righteousness, on pain of being excluded, then why 
should she not perform that duty with uncompromising 
fidelity ? Why should she admit to the Supper one 
whom she regards as refusing to submit to the rite of 
baptism according to. the Lord's requirement ? It may 
be painful to exclude him, but if the church is really 
charged with the duty of so using the power of the keys 
as to enforce in this manner all righteousness, why 
should she not perform it? Why should she compro- 
mise her duty as an act of comity to those who disobey 
the Lord ? Exclusive communion is only the consistent 
use of the power of the keys. 

That which is really shocking is the assumption that 
the church under any organization whatever is charged 
with the duty or invested with the authority to use the 
Lord's Supper as an instrument of discipline. This is 
precisely the thing which must be shown from the clear 
testimony of Scripture in order to indicate the founda- 
tion on which the whole sect system rests, from the 
ante-Nicene age of the church to the present time. If 
that can be made out from Scripture, then let not the 
18 



274 THE KEYS OF SECT 

church shrink from the performance of her duty. Let 
no modern ideas of comity deter her from the use of 
the keys in vindication of all righteousness. But this is 
the point which can never be made out. There is not 
a hint in the New Testament of the church being 
charged with such a responsibility, or invested with 
such an authority. It is in direct contradiction of that 
religious liberty, that liberty of conscience which lies at 
the very foundation of Christianity. 

What does any church Protestant or Catholic mean, 
when it makes the solemn decision, that such a person 
is excluded from the communion, till he does this or 
does that ? Can it mean anything else than to assert 
the claim that, at least in respect to its own members, 
it holds the key to the Lord's Supper, and can exclude 
any individual member from it at its discretion ? Let us 
take an example. The judicatories of the Presbyterian 
Church adopt the regulation that dancing is to be 
regarded and treated as a sin, and subjected to disci- 
pline accordingly. Let me not be misunderstood. 
I am not an advocate of dancing as it is practised 
among the fashionable amusements of the time. That 
is not the question. The question which I raise is, 
whether the Presbyterian Church in the United States 
has a warrant • to employ the Lord's Supper as an 
instrument of prohibiting that amusement. For myself 
I am utterly shocked at the assumption. Vast multitudes 
of enlightened men are shocked at it. This is the 
reason why the discipline of the church can never be 
enforced against it. But the reason is a great deal 
more fundamental than at first view it seems to be. 
According to the theory of church discipline which 
prevails throughout Christendom, the church in its 
corporate capacity has an unlimited right to judge of 
all points of Christian belief and Christian practice, and 



SECT ANTICHRISTIAN. 275 

may use its control over the Lord's Supper in enforcing 
its judgments upon individual conscience at its discre- 
tion. For if Jesus Christ conferred this power at all, it 
is certain he never limited it by any exact definitions. 
It is unlimited in practice. If any one says it should be 
limited, I answer, then Jesus Christ should have limited 
it, if he conferred it at ail. This he has certainly not 
done. 

The power is capable of being used not only to 
enforce doctrines and duties, but to procure submission 
to all the laws and regulations which any body of men 
calling themselves a church of Christ may choose to 
enact and establish, and especially in enforcing the 
authority of the church itself. No matter how the 
church is constituted, its language to the individual is, 
submit or be excommunicated ; and excommunicated 
means of course deprivation of the Lord's Supper. 
Our question is a very simple one, Did Jesus Christ 
ever grant such a power to any church under any 
organization ? Can it be proved from the New Testa- 
ment ? If it can, I submit, and shall never be shocked 
at exclusive communion. But I am shocked at the 
presumption which has pervaded Christendom for so 
many centuries, that he ever committed to his church 
such power over individual conscience. This is where 
the shock should come in. 

The worst feature in the case is the indefiniteness of 
the power conferred on the church, if any is conferred. 
If the grant of power had been made perfectly explicit, 
and the constitution of the body on which it was con- 
ferred had been accurately defined, and if the rules of 
judgment according to which the power was to be 
exerted had been made as exact and definite as the 
imperfections of human language permit, even then the 
coroorate authority of the church over individual con- 



276 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

science would have imposed a restraint on individual 
liberty quite inconsistent with the spirit of Christianity. 
But all these conditions of definiteness are entirety 
wanting. One body of men may constitute the church 
in one way, and another in another, and each may 
equally claim the power of the keys. The rules accord- 
ing to which the power is to be exercised are equally 
indefinite. Hildebrand may employ it to humble kings 
and emperors at his feet, and a modern Baptist church 
to enforce immersion. One church may employ it 
against freemasonry, another against the use of tobacco, 
another against dancing, another still to prescribe the 
version of the Psalms of David which shall be used in 
social worship. One church may employ it to enforce 
the color and texture and form of clerical vestments, 
and the very words in which Christian congregations 
shall approach to God in worship, and another to dis- 
countenance "the worldly luxury of long hair." That 
our Lord ever conferred such a power on the church is 
utterly incredible, and if there were any hint in the 
New Testament that he did confer it, that fact would 
immensely increase our difficulty in defending the New 
Testament, as worthy of the source from which it 
claims to have come. 

It is quite groundless, and indeed puerile, to claim 
for any one of the existing religious bodies, that it is 
exempt from this indefiniteness. Let any one claiming 
this show the explicit grant of power and the exact 
definition of the jurisdiction. The Anglican, the Papal, 
the Presbyterian, and the Congregational must alike 
fail in the attempt. If the power of the keys was 
granted to any of these, it is left as indefinite as the 
circle of human relations and duties, and the claim of 
any church to the possession of that power is a claim 
of unlimited right to exercise authority over the individ 



SECT ANTICHRISTIAN. 277 

ual conscience. This is the vicious element which 
inheres in the whole sect system. It is the cor- 
rupting influence of asserting and exercising such a 
power over the consciences of men, that constitutes the 
ambitious and unscrupulous character of sect, wherever 
it is found. Bodies of men accustomed to claim and 
exercise such powers will always be ambitious of their 
own aggrandizement, and reckless of the consequences 
of the measures deemed necessary to secure that 
aggrandizement. The interests of sect will be pre- 
dominant, and have more influence than any genuine 
regard for the moral and spiritual welfare of the com- 
munity. It is nothing at all strange, that sect so con- 
stituted should, with unscrupulous energy, drive the 
wedge of division through any community however 
small, and unable to sustain several different religious 
organizations ; nor that these organizations should be 
tenaciously adhered to for generations, at the expense 
of whatever disaster to the Christian cause. 

As good men become acquainted with the sad condi- 
tions of religious society in many of our new settle- 
ments, they are filled with wonder, why things should 
be as they find they are. Why will men who believe 
in Christ and have a sincere attachment to his cause 
persist in sustaining six churches of as many different 
sects in a community of twelve hundred people ? Any 
man of sense will say, it is a monstrous waste of money 
and personal energy and ministerial talent, — a waste 
which the Christian community is utterly unable to 
afford ; and so it is. If in the world of business like 
waste were penetrated, if men would persist in build- 
ing six steam flouring mills where one was quite suffi- 
cient to grind all the wheat produced, or in building 
and equipping six first-class railways, where one was 
amply sufficient for all the traffic, and in conducting 



278 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

things in the same way in every other branch of busi- 
ness, nothing could come to that community but weak- 
ness, embarrassment and universal bankruptcy. This 
method is no better in religious than in secular things. 
Why then do we persist in it, in all the religious 
arrangements of our country, and to some extent of 
the whole Christian world ? The answer is obvious. 
We have admitted an antichristian element into the 
constitution of the church, which insures its being con- 
stantly worked for the aggrandizement of sect rather 
than for the promotion of Christian interests. It 
always will be so worked, till we consent to eliminate 
that antichristian element from the constitution of the 
church of Christ. 

As things now are, besides the papal church, which 
under the present order of things is sure to be ubiqui- 
tous, we have five great Protestant sects, which, in this 
country at least, are destined to be ubiquitous also. 
Their number maybe increased, but there is not the 
faintest hope of any diminution. Besides these five, 
we have many sects which, though less universal than 
these, are yet widely prevalent, and two or three organi- 
zations of this class are likely to be found in almost 
every Christian community. It is therefore reasonable 
to expect, at least in all the more recently settled por- 
tions of our country, from six to eight distinct religious 
sects in every community. The experience of the past 
clearly shows in respect to them, that the conclusions 
drawn in the previous paragraphs are mournfully sus- 
tained by historic fact. Let any good man, endowed 
with whatever proportion of Christian zeal and persua- 
sive eloquence, go to one of these communities so ruin- 
ously divided, and endeavor to persuade them to lay 
aside their divisions, and unite in one strong Christian 
church, and he will soon find an insuperable obstacle 



SECT ANTICHRISTIAN. ' 279 

to the success of his endeavors, in that zeal for sectarian 
aggrandizement which I have described ; nor will he 
ever be successful in his laudable endeavors, till he 
can persuade the Christian people of that community 
to return to the church of the apostles. That lust of 
power which stands opposed like an iron wall against 
all his endeavors will remain unbroken, while the sects 
retain their present organic principles. His best en- 
deavors will be impotent and vain. 

There is in the minds of Christian people an almost 
universal consciousness that sect is antichristian. The 
proof of this is almost constantly before our eyes. It 
has come to be a generally acknowledged truth, that 
there is scarcely any hope of a successful aggressive 
movement for the promotion of the kingdom of Christ, 
except on condition that Christians of different sects 
shall heartily co-operate in the effort, and forget as 
much as possible the lines of division which separate 
them. It is curious, it is sometimes almost ludicrous, 
to see how much pains gootl people will take to seem 
indifferent to sect on such occasions, and if possible to 
make the world forget that they are of different sects. 
If each of these organizations is a really valuable 
instrument for building up the kingdom of Christ in the 
world, why lay it aside on such an occasion ? If it is 
helpful to ordinary work, why not to extraordinary ? 
Why does it become useless and worse than useless as 
soon as men resolve to put forth unusual efforts for the 
promotion of those objects for the sake of which only 
the church exists ? The fact that good people so gener- 
ally admit that their sectarian relations to each other 
are in such circumstances harmful, is a virtual conces- 
sion, that they are always harmful, that their real spirit 
and natural impression upon the minds of the people 
always present an obstruction to the proper influence of 



280 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

Christianity upon the world. Why then as soon as the 
extraordinary effort is at an end, should the high tide 
of unsectarian co-operation recede to its ordinary level, 
and all the landmarks of sect become as obtrusively 
apparent as ever ? Why do all the recruiting officers 
of sect now employ themselves each in gathering into 
his own little enclosure as many of the converts as 
possible ? If sect is injurious in times of religious 
excitement and fervor, why not abandon it finally and 
forever, and so organize the sacramental host of God's 
elect, as to be always prepared to engage in the work of 
the Lord with utmost advantage ? There is but one 
answer to such inquiries as these. There is something 
vicious in the very constitution of the church itself. In 
view of the principle which we have fully established in 
the progress of this work, there is no difficulty at all in 
ascertaining what it is which produces all this mischief. 
So long as the power of the keys is adhered to in the 
sense in which it has been understood for ages, each of 
these sects is a spiritual despotism, eager to extend its 
jurisdiction over the greatest possible numbers, and 
unscrupulous in the choice of its means for promoting 
its own aggrandizement. Sometimes for a little season 
the love of Christ will triumph over sect ; but it will be 
only for a little season, the evil genius of sect will soon 
assert itself, and reduce all things again to the vulgar 
level of sectarian rivalry. 

In the midst of this scene of painful conflict there are 
many devout persons who clearly perceive that sect is 
antichristian, and earnestly desire to avoid it. There 
is nothing for which they so intensely long as to build 
the church of Christ upon the foundation of apostles 
and prophets, Jesus Christ being himself the chief 
corner-stone. What shall such persons do ? They 
intensely feel that the existing sects in a given commu- 



SECT ANTICHRISTIAN. 2 8. 1 

nity are neither organized or worked in accordance with 
the divine conception, and that to unite with any of 
them is to consent to the perpetuity of the existing 
order of things. To organize a new Christian society 
on the true apostolic basis is to add another feeble and 
struggling church organization, to those which already 
divide and weaken a sect-distracted community. The 
question, What in such circumstances ought to be done ? 
often occasions no small perplexity, and it may be 
impossible to lay down any general rule, which will be 
applicable to all cases. But surely the time has come, 
when that conception of the church which everywhere 
pervades the New Testament should be asserted, not 
only in words, but in practical organizations. It is one 
of the most hopeful symptoms of the time, that there are 
thousands of persons who can consent to no church 
organization on any other basis, not because they are 
sectarians, but because they are in principle averse to 
the whole sect system. 

We cannot turn our eyes in any direction upon the 
religious scenery around us without encountering the 
most mournful illustrations of the principle asserted in 
this chapter. Surely it does not require argument to 
prove, that the Christian church should be in such a 
.sense one, as to present no obstruction to the ready 
co-operation of all Christian people in any effort to 
promote the intellectual, moral and spiritual well-being 
of the whole community ; or rather that it ought to 
facilitate and favor such co-operation. The man who 
does not know that the actual organization of the church 
presents obstacles nearly insuperable to all such co- 
operation knows very little of the real world he lives in. 
For example the city of Chicago, the existence of which 
dates back less than a half-century, has, either within 
itsdf or in its immediate vicinity, four theological 



2^2 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

seminaries, all Protestant, all controlled by religious 
bodies that recognize each other as integral portions of 
the one blessed fellowship of Christ, all looking to the 
Scriptures as the one all-sufficient rule of faith and 
practice. All have then absolutely the same end in 
view, — to train up a teaching ministry, qualified to 
instruct mankind in the religion of the Bible. Substan- 
tially and for the great practical purposes of the Chris- 
tian ministry, they have not four gospels, but one and 
the same gospel. The same gospel sermon will be 
equally acceptable in all their congregations. 

Why then must there be four seminaries ? The 
resources which each will require to furnish such an 
equipment as its friends deem necessary will run up 
into the millions. One seminary, costing very little 
more than each of them must cost if they remain sepa- 
rate, could do the work better than the four. Why 
then must their separate existence be maintained ? In 
the scarcity of resources, why must they remain sepa- 
rately weak, while united they might be strong, and yet 
liberal Christian people be compelled to bear burdens 
which they are scarcely able to sustain, and which 
greatly limit their beneficence in every other direction ? 
Again one answer only can be returned. The Christian 
people of these Northwestern States are organized 
under four distinct governments. Each of those gov- 
ernments claims to have possession of Peter's key, and 
wields it each in its own way as an instrument, and for 
the most part the only instrument, by which it asserts 
and exercises its authority. It constructs its own con- 
stitution, makes its own laws, establishes its own execu- 
tive and its own judiciary, and enforces submission only 
by the exercise of its power of excluding from participa- 
tion in Christian rites. Take this power away from 
each of them, and they would be dissolved and fall to 



SECT ANTICHRISTIAN. 283 

pieces as naturally as a mass of rock will crumble, when 
its particles lose the power of cohesion. Let each 
retain this organic force, and they will remain separate 
bodies politic, thoroughly imbued with zeal for self- 
aggrandizement, and eager to extend their jurisdiction 
as widely as possible. Each will no more readily intrust 
the education of its youth to the control and manage- 
ment of any other, than the government of England will 
intrust the adjudication of the rights of its subjects to 
the courts of France or Germany. Each regards the 
control of a theological seminary as an indispensable 
instrument of its power. As long as the separate gov- 
ernments exist, the four seminaries must exist also ; and 
we waste our breath and our eloquence in trying to 
show that this is bad economy, or that it is disastrous to 
Christian interests to however great an extent. The 
spirit of sect is utterly unscrupulous. 

This is only one example of thousands. Our whole 
country, all Christendom, is full of them. To seek a 
remedy is absolutely useless and hopeless, while the 
church of Christ continues to be constructed upon the 
sectarian principle as at present. If the Founder of 
Christianity conferred the power of the keys upon the 
church, and yet gave no explicit constitution to the 
church, and no definition of its powers, then he himself 
became responsible for the present factious condition 
of the church, and all its miserable consequences. 
With devout gratitude I affirm, not only that that power 
was never conferred by him, but that it is clearly and 
obviously contradictory to the law of the Messianic 
kingdom. It savors not of the things that are of God, 
but of the things that are of men. 

It is necessary here distinctly to advise the reader, 
that I am quite aware that many persons will be dis- 
posed to urge an objection which will seem to them 



284 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

quite conclusive against the previous argument. My 
argument all along assumes, that the power of the keys 
is essential to the very existence of the several sects as 
distinct bodies, and that if this were taken away, they 
would be disintegrated and cease to exist. The objec- 
tion is, that the power of the keys is as necessary to the 
existence of the church itself, as of the various sects 
into which it is divided ; and that therefore if you divest 
the church of that power, it will be dissolved and cease 
to exist as certainly as they. It is therefore claimed, 
that in destroying sect I have destroyed the church as 
well. This is not the place to discuss the question 
which this objection raises. The reader may be fu'ly 
assured however, that I have no intention of evading 
it, and that it shall be fully considered in a future chap- 
ter. I will in this place only suggest for the considera- 
tion of the reader, whether he may not have mistaken 
the nature of the cohesive attraction which binds the 
church of Christ together. May not its organization 
be produced and sustained by a force stronger than 
that of sect, and as consistent with individual liberty, as 
that is destructive of it ? 

The current history of our times abounds with illus- 
trations of the omnipresence, throughout Christendom, 
of the antichristian spirit of ecclesiastical domination. 
The very atmosphere is poisoned by it. Events which 
should shock every devout man occur almost daily 
before our eyes, and are looked upon only as the normal 
incidents of our religious history. I can find space but 
for a single example. On a certain Sabbath in July, 
I believe, in the year 1867, Rev. Stephen H. Tyng, Jr., 
an accredited minister of the Protestant Episcopal 
Church in the United States, and more and better than 
this, a minister of Christ whose praise is in all the 
churches, in accordance with a previous appointment, 



SECT ANTICHRISTIAN. 285 

preached to a congregation of men and women who 
had devoutly assembled to hear him, in the city of New 
Brunswick, New Jersey. Certain other Episcopal clergy- 
men — men, as I am told on credible authority, of excel- 
lent Christian character and spirit — had charge of par- 
ishes in that city defined and described by the authority 
of the Protestant Episcopal Church. These brethren 
forbade Mr. Tyng's preaching at the time and place 
appointed, claiming that by so doing he would infringe 
upon their prerogatives as rectors of their respective 
parishes. Mr. Tyng thought the prerogative of a Chris- 
tian minister was, to preach the gospel, not to forbid 
others to preach it, and that he ought to preach in that 
city on that dry under his commission from the one 
Head of the church universal, and did so, disregarding 
the aforesaid prohibition. 

Steps were immediately taken to bring him to trial 
and punishment for this act, as a violation of a law, a 
canon of the church. He was summoned before a 
court assembled by the authority and under the laws of 
a great national sovereignty, claiming and exercising a 
territorial jurisdiction coextensive with our national , 
domain. Before that court Mr. Tyng appeared, and 
pleaded not guilty, thus acknowledging its authority. 
He submitted to all the forms of a trial for a criminal 
offence. He was condemned and sentenced, and that 
sentence was executed in one of the great metropolitan 
churches of this free country, by one of the highest 
officials of the Protestant Episcopal Church. Mr. Tyng 
went without compulsion to the place of execution, and 
stood up before the congregation to receive the sentence 
of admonition, which the court had awarded him for 
the crime of preaching the gospel of Christ in the city 
of New Brunswick. Mr. Tyng still remains a clergy- 
man of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United 



286 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

States, subject to that pretended authority which tried, 
condemned and punished him for his earnest fidelity 
to the Master. His abounding zeal and labors In behalf 
of the gospel of Christ secure to him the affectionate 
reverence of all the true followers of Christ. But let 
him be assured that millions have felt a sense of shame 
not to be expressed, at the humiliation of the Christian 
ministry which he permitted, by submitting himself to 
be thus trampled down by a usurping hierarchy. As I 
read the account of the transaction at the time, a sense 
of personal degradation came over me, and I feel the 
blush of shame rushing to my cheeks whenever I call 
it to remembrance. 

The existence of this ambitious and grasping spirit 
in all the religious sects of modern times is so notorious 
as to be an admitted and assumed fact over all Chris- 
tendom. The apologists for sect may and will deny it. 
But under certain aspects of the subject, they in com- 
mon with all other men will show that they admit and 
assume it. Nothing is more common in the literature 
of the time than the assertion, that under such a repub- 
lican government as ours, the only assurance we can 
have that some one religious sect will not gain such an 
ascendency, as to be able to control a majority of all 
the suffrages of the nation, overturn the present consti- 
tution of the country, and erect itself into a national 
religion, supported at the public expense, is found in 
the multiplicity of sects, and their jealousy of each 
other. This has passed even into a recognized principle 
of statesmanship. Some of our wisest statesmen have 
taught us to exult in the multiplicity of our sects, as 
affording our best possible security against the estab- 
lishment of a state religion. I quote the following 
from James Madison : — 

" In free governments the security for civil rights 



SECT ANTICHRISTIAN. 2S7 

must be the same as that for religious rights. It con- 
sists in the one case in the multiplicity of interests, and 
in the other in the multiplicity of sects." 1 

There are very few Americans who would not with- 
out any hesitation accept this view of the case as sound 
and just. It may be regarded as an axiom in American 
politics. Who ever called it in question ? But what is 
its meaning when translated into plain English ? No 
one can hesitate a moment to answer. It is that all 
sects are not only ambitious and grasping for more 
power, but selfish and unscrupulous ; that they are one 
and all watching their opportunity, like so many hungry 
beasts of prey, ready to devour, whenever the oppor- 
tunity may be afforded, the liberties of their country 
and of mankind; and that our liberties are safe for a 
single year only because sects are so numerous and 
so intensely jealous of each other, that no one of 
them has any prospect of gaining such national ascen- 
dency as would render the accomplishment of this 
flagitious purpose possible. According to this view 
of the subject, we continue to enjoy religious liberty 
in this country, not because it is the enlightened 
choice of the whole nation, but because its enemies are 
too numerous and too jealous of each other, ever to 
permit any one of them to accomplish its destruction; 
very much as Turkey retains -its national independence, 
not by its own strength, but by the mutual rivalries 
of the other powers of Europe, each desirous to 
devour it. 

This is a very serious subject, and worthy of the most 
earnest consideration of all who love the church of 
Christ. We deceive ourselves if we believe that the 
Christian religion can stand in such an attitude before 

1 Federalist, No. 51. 



288 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

the world, without greatly damaging its claims, and to 
no small extent depriving it of the affectionate rever- 
ence of mankind. There are multitudes of men among 
us, who do intensely hate " the sects," as they call them, 
because they believe them to be actuated by just such 
a grasping and ambitious Spirit, and who are perfectly 
confident that in hating "the sects" they are hating 
Christianity itself, because they regard the two things as 
entirely identical. That such men are very superficial 
thinkers is certainly not to be denied. But most men 
are superficial thinkers, and Christ came into the world 
to save them for all that. The position of the Chris- 
tian church in the nineteenth centu."^ is eminently fitted 
to make just such an impression on millions of men, 
who are superficial thinkers, and eager to escape the 
moral restraints which the Christian religion imposes ; 
and sect is driving such men to their utter ruin. Their 
mistake lies in assuming that Christianity is identical 
with sect. Let us thank God that it is not. But they 
are not mistaken in believing that the religious sects of 
the time do manifest in innumerable ways the selfish 
and ambitious spirit with which, they are charged. 
Many of the facts referred to in this and the preceding 
chapters prove the justness of this charge beyond con- 
troversy. 

Nor need we wonder, that while Christianity is, as at 
present, publicly manifested to the world almost entirely 
through these sects, millions of men are betrayed into the 
error of regarding Christianity and sect as identical. 
Such will always continue to be the fact, so long as the 
two things continue to stand in their present unnatural 
relations to each other. Sect is in its nature and spirit 
antichristian. God forbid it should any longer stand 
forth before the world as the representative of the 
religion of Jesus Christ. Sect is no better fitted to 






SECT ANTICHRISTIAN. 289 

represent the kingdom of Christ, than Satan is to repre- 
sent God. If we ever mean truly to place before the 
world the glad tidings of the crucified and risen Christ, 
we must divorce Christianity from this unholy alliance 
with sect. The iniquitous bond cannot be too speedily 
sundered. 



19 



2go THE KEYS OF SECT. 



CHAPTER IV. 

WHAT IS THE REMEDY? 

The views which devout men take of the sect ques- 
tion are for the most part capable of being compre- 
hended in two classes. First, there are many who 
acknowledge the evils which come from our sectarian 
divisions, and deplore them ; but they see no remedy, 
and therefore think it wise to bear them with patience 
and resignation, and render them as small as possible 
by cultivating everywhere a forbearing and fraternal 
spirit, and even by diverting as far as possible the public 
mind from the consciousness of their existence. If one 
is afflicted with an incurable disease, it is wise as far as 
he can to divert his own attention and that of his 
friends from its existence, and as far as in his power to 
behave in all respects as he would if he were in perfect 
health. 

The other class is composed of those who think, that, 
inasmuch as there is no remedy, and sect is a phenome- 
non inseparable from religious freedom, it cannot be 
altogether evil. It must have its uses. Those uses 
they seek to find out, as they would seek for the uses of 
tornadoes, thunder-storms and pestilences; and they 
think they have found them, and are therefore ready on 
all occasions to do battle in defence of sect by whom- 
soever assailed. Yet the real condition of their minds 
after all is that of making the best of the inevitable. 



WHAT IS THE REMEDY? 2CJI 

They never would have thought sect a good, if they 
had not first believed it to be an unavoidable conse- 
quence of that precious thing — religious freedom. 

To each of these classes of persons the question which 
stands at the head of this chapter is equally interesting 
and important. If even the apologist for sect could see 
a clear and practicable remedy, by the application of 
which it could be removed from the Christian church, 
he would not be unwilling to be relieved from the 
burdensome task of vindicating a state of things which, 
at best, has in it so much that is repulsive and dis- 
gusting to every devout and spiritually cultivated 
mind. On the other hand, those who regard sect as 
an unmitigated but irremediable evil, would accept an 
intelligible and practicable remedy with sincere thank- 
fulness, and engage in their Christian work with renewed 
energy and hopefulness. Certainly the application of a 
sound and effectual remedy to this class of evils would 
add immensely to the effectiveness of all Christian 
effort, and diminish the burdens under which Christian 
society labors. It was only in the hope of contributing 
something to the solution of this question, or at least 
of strengthening the belief that such a remedy would 
ultimately be found and applied, that this work was 
undertaken. 

What then is the remedy ? In general terms the 
answer of course is, that all Christian disciples must 
organize the church in all respects according to the 
pattern which our Lord has furnished us, and not only 
cheerfully consent but gladly make haste, to abandon 
all modes of organization which do not agree with that 
pattern. To this proposition I shall meet, on the very 
threshold of the discussion, the objection that there is 
no pattern. Nothing is more confidently asserted, or 
oftener repeated than that no church polity is laid down 



292 



THE KEYS OF SECT. 



in the New Testament. This point must therefore be 
carefully examined ; for if it may be certainly assumed 
that there must be a church polity, and yet that nothing 
of the sort is furnished in the New Testament, to seek 
a remedy for sect is manifestly absurd. 

An intelligent view of this subject cannot be taken 
without first considering a previous . question. What do 
we mean by a church polity ? We must have a defini- 
tion of that phrase, for without one it is obviously im- 
possible to determine whether a church polity is found 
in the Scriptures or not. If I mistake not the reason why 
men so confidently assert that no church polity is found 
in the Scriptures is, that they have in their own minds a 
notion of the subject, which is contradictory to the 
conception according to which Jesus Christ intended to 
constitute the church, and are seeking to find that notion 
in the Scriptures. This point must be made plain. If 
we are searching the Scriptures for a chinch polity, we 
must know what we are looking for, or we shall not 
know whether it is there or not. 

For fifteen centuries and more, one element has 
always been present in men's conceptions of a church 
polity. That element is the power of the keys in its 
historic sense. To this hour men search the Scriptures 
with the assumption preoccupying their minds, that 
there can be no platform of the church which does not 
provide for the exercise of that power, by defining the 
official and corporate machinery by which it is to be 
exerted, and the rules and methods of its action, and 
also for designating and inducting into office the men 
who are qualified and authorized to exhibit the rites of 
baptism and the Lord's Supper to the people. If this 
is the church polity we are looking for, it is not at all 
strange we do not find it in the Scriptures, for it has 
already been shown that it is not there, and that it is 



WHAT IS THE REMEDY ? 293 

contrary to the divine conception according to which 
the church was founded. 

Precisely at this point two great divisions of Christen- 
dom diverge from each other. Prelatists and anti- 
prelatists approach this subject with the same assump- 
tion, — that any platform of polity must provide for the 
exercise of these fundamental elements of church power. 
The former examine the Scriptures, as supplemented by 
the customs and traditions of the church in the ages 
immediately subsequent to that of the apostles. They 
have no difficulty in finding in very early ages, certainly 
not later than the first half of the third century, the 
platform they desire, — a clergy invested with the power 
of the keys, existing in the three orders of bishops, 
presbyters and deacons. As this constitution of the 
church does not appear to have been a novelty in the times 
for example of Cyprian and Tertullian, the inference is 
confidently drawn, that this constitution of the church 
must have been derived from the apostles, and must 
therefore be obligatory on all Christian people every- 
where. I make the assertion very advisedly. This is 
the only foundation of argument which prelacy has to 
rest upon. It does not, it cannot find that church 
polity which it seeks to impose on the consciences of 
all Christ's disciples in the New Testament taken only 
by itself, and interpreted according to the received laws 
of literary and historical criticism j but only as supple- 
mented by the customs and traditions of the two subse- 
quent centuries. The conclusion is made out only by 
reading those customs and traditions into the New Tes- 
tament. The more a man knows of the religious, 
literary and social condition of those centuries, the 
more earnestly he will protest against such an interpo- 
lation of the apostolic records. 

Anti-prelatists insist for the most part, that the 



294 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

question must be decided by apostolic authority only, 
allowing little or no weight to the usages of after ages. 
It has already been sufficiently shown in these pages, 
that this is the only rational mode of treating the ques- 
tion. To look for the true idea of the Christian church 
in the second and third centuries is like looking for- the 
true model of the Roman republic in the times of Trajan 
and the Antonines. Yet, in common with prelatists, 
they come to the study of the Scriptures with the 
undoubting assumption, that there can be no church 
polity which does not prescribe the mode of exercising 
the power of the keys, and of qualifying a clergy to 
officiate in administering the external rites of Christian- 
ity. It is certain they can find no such platform in the 
New Testament. Many do indeed suppose that they 
find such a platform in the directions given by our 
Saviour for dealing with an offending brother. 1 But a 
careful examination of those words shows that they have 
no relation to the government of the church, and give 
no support to the power of the keys as understood in 
the church history of subsequent ages, except by a mis- 
interpretation so obvious and glaring, that its influence 
on the church through so many ages is humiliating to 
the Christian scholar. It cannot therefore but be con- 
ceded by anti-prelatists generally, that with their pre- 
conception of a church polity, no such thing can be 
found in the Scriptures. Still they doubt not, that that 
church power which has been described by the phrase 
"power of the keys " is Scriptural, and necessary to the 
government of the church, though they find no pre- 
scribed constitution by which it is to be exercised. 

The conclusion from these premises is inevitable, 
that it must have been the intention of the founder of 

1 Matt, xviii : 15-20. See also Chap. IV., Part I. 



WHAT IS THE REMEDY? 295 

Christianity to leave the constitution of the church to 
the taste and large discretion of all Christian people. 
The very flood-gates of sect are thus thrown wide open, 
and can never be closed again while these assumptions 
are adhered to. Any company of persons professing 
faith in Jesus Christ may construct a church according 
to any constitution they may devise or fancy, and in 
any local situation, and it will become at once invested 
with all the authority and sacredness of the Church of 
Christ, the kingdom of God on earth. This is sect in 
its elementary principle. This is what all church gov- 
ernment must be, if we retain the power of the keys, 
and yet can find no church polity in the New Testa- 
ment. 

Yet the case of prelatists and anti-prelatists is not after 
all so very different as at first it might seem. The former 
are indeed enabled, by the help of the church history 
of the dark and superstitious ages which followed that 
of the apostles, to read between the lines of the New 
Testament a clergy in three orders empowered to gov- 
ern the church in all ages. But the body of legislation 
by which that clergy is to govern is all left to* man's 
device, without a hint from the divine Teacher. Who 
shall tell us which has the true system of ecclesiastical 
constitutions and laws, — the Byzantine church, or the 
papal, or the Anglican, or the reformed Episcopal ? 
The only answer our prelatical friends can give us is, - 
that we must ascertain which has the true apostolic 
succession. . This affords very little light to our per- 
plexed minds, while we entertain the undoubting belief, 
that it is demonstrable that no such succession exists. 
Rrghtly viewed, prelatical church polity is no less con- 
fused and anarchic than anti-prelatical. Under the 
dire necessity of constructing the government of the 
church of Christ according to the device of men are we 



296 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

all left, if we insist on retaining that preconceived 
notion of a church polity, which has been for ages com- 
mon to both these great divisions of Christendom. 

Let us then at last consent to an altered statement 
of the problem to be solved. Let us no longer mean 
by a church polity a constitution and body of laws by 
which the power of the keys is to be exercised, but a 
clear exposition of the social relations in which our 
Lord intended that his people should stand to each 
other in this world. Let us admit that our Lord's 
words to Peter have been sadly misinterpreted and mis- 
applied, and that baptism and the Lord's Supper are 
not intended to be in any sense instruments of govern- 
ment, but rites to be freely and fraternally observed by 
all the Lord's people, as divinely appointed symbols of 
fundamental Christian truth, and as badges to be vol- 
untarily and lovingly worn by all his disciples. If, with 
such a conception of the nature of the problem, we 
search the Scriptures to find its solution, the difficulties, 
which before were insurmountable, will vanish, and we 
shall easily find in the apostolic records all the church 
polity we need. 

What that polity is has been already sufficiently ex- 
plained in the first six chapters of this book. It only 
remains to be shown that the conception of the church 
exhibited in those chapters, if accepted by the Lord's 
people will prove a sufficient remedy for the prevailing 
evils of sect. The general principle upon which it will 
act as a remedy may perhaps be made obvious by an 
illustration drawn from material things. If two sub- 
stances having a strong affinity for each other, but 
strongly united in separate masses by cohesive attrac- 
tion, are placed in external contact, no chemical com- 
bination will take place. They will remain separate, as 
though no affinity existed between the particles of which 



WHAT IS THE REMEDY? 297 

they are composed. But if by any means their cohe- 
sive attraction is destroyed, and they are mingled in a 
state of minute division, chemical affinity will take effect, 
and new and permanent compounds will be formed. 

This well illustrates the relation in which the dis- 
ciples of Christ stand to each other under our sect sys- 
tem. Christian people are everywhere conscious of 
strong moral affinities tending to combine them in per- 
manent relations far more fraternal and co-operative 
than those which at present exist. These conscious 
affinities are constantly counteracted by the various 
sectarian organizations by which they are separated 
from each other in their ordinary religious life and 
activity. No larger unity can be attained to, until by 
some means the cohesive attraction by which sects are 
held together can be broken up. Precisely this will be 
accomplished for the whole church of God under heaven, 
by adopting everywhere a true conception of the church 
as Jesus founded it. The cement which holds our sects 
together, and tenaciously prolongs their separate life, 
is found in those false assumptions of churchly and 
priestly powers, which have been pointed out in the pre- 
vious chapters of this work. Eliminate those assump- 
tions from the Christian mind of the world, and the most 
compact structures of ecclesiasticism on earth will fall 
to pieces ; and the individual disciples now embraced in 
them will be free to obey those spiritual affinities, which 
tend permanently to unite them in loving co-operation 
and fraternity with all that believe in Christ. It will 
not then be necessary to preach Christian union, and 
publish periodicals devoted to its advocacy. It will be 
produced by the operation of a permanent law of spirit- 
ual life. These effects will not be instantaneous and 
convulsive, but gradual and quiet, like the coming of 
spring after a long, cold winter, so gradual as to be 



298 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

almost imperceptible ; but as irresistible as they are 
tranquil, and as genial and beneficent as the warm sun- 
shine and soft breezes of spring. Sect will perish, 
because the principle of its life has been destroyed. 
Sectarian organizations will be dissolved and pass away, 
leaving not a wreck behind, because the cement that 
bound them together has ceased to exist. 

Let us illustrate this by applying these principles to 
the solid and seemingly imperishable structure of the 
papal church. That is not only one of the sects, but 
it is the strongest and most compact of them all. Yet 
let that conception of the Christian church which has 
been set forth in these pages be accepted by the masses 
which compose that church, and that vast superstruc- 
ture of superstition and spiritual despotism, now seem- 
ing to defy all the attacks of man, and the all-destroying 
power of time itself, would not endure for a single half- 
century. Take from the pope his pretended "keys of 
St. Peter," and he will be a pope no longer. Take 
from the priesthood its pretended power, to render 
sacraments valid, and of binding and of losing, and it 
will be a priesthood no longer. Let but the laity of the 
papal church see and accept that spiritual view of the 
kingdom of heaven which appears on the pages of the 
New Testament, and the chains of that spiritual despot- 
ism will fall from their souls, and they will walk forth 
in the freedom of the Lord. Meanwhile not one ele- 
ment of the spiritual power of the gospel will have 
been assailed or endangered ; not one attractive force 
that draws any man to Christ and to fraternal union 
with all the Lord's people will have been weakened, but 
all immensely strengthened. 

There is no thoughtful Protestant who does not feel 
the baleful influence of Rome on all the religious inter- 
ests of mankind. Let then all Protestants unite in 



WHAT IS THE REMEDY ? 299 

putting away from themselves every remnant and vestige 
of that system of church power in which all the strength 
of Rome is found, and which rests not on a scriptural 
foundation, but only on the traditions and usages of 
superstitious ages ; let all the millions of Protestantism 
lift up their hands freed from all the shackles of spiritual 
despotism ; let them one and all abjure that pretended 
power of the keys by which Rome has ruled Christendom 
as with a rod of iron for more than twelve centuries ; 
let them lift up their multitudinous voices in united 
protest against all those priestly powers and functions 
by which men have been deceived and cheated of their 
liberty in Christ from the days of the early fathers ; let 
them show that Protestantism is not a failure, by exhib- 
iting a spiritual union in the freedom of Christ grander 
than Rome ever produced by her boasted organic Cath- 
olicity ; let them consent to do all this, and they will 
then, and not till then, assail the papal power at the 
only point where it is vulnerable. When Protestants 
are ready to make such an onset on Rome, they may do 
it with some reasonable hope of success. Till then 
success is impossible. Several controversies of great 
vehemence have occurred in our day between cham- 
pions of Rome and of Protestantism. But in the prog- 
ress of those controversies it has become painfully 
apparent, that both combatants were on the same side 
of the question. You cannot overthrow popery without 
uprooting the power of the keys ; and you will not be 
likely to succeed in uprooting the power of the keys, 
while you yourself adhere to it. 

The papal church is the prince of sects. It is easy 
to perceive, that the principles propounded in this vol- 
ume would utterly subvert that sect, vast and strong as 
it is, and that without the least tendency to weaken the 
Christian faith of one of its adherents. It is just as 



300 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

evident that these same principles are in like manner 
destructive of every other sect in Christendom. If the 
remedy is applicable to the strongest and most compact 
of sects, it will be found equally effective when applied 
to a sect which is without compactness or centralization. 
Let us suppose that a Christian community is composed 
of persons who are quite homogeneous both in faith 
and government, except on questions pertaining to bap 1 
tism. In respect to those questions they are divided, a 
part adhering to a Congregational, and a part to a 
Baptist church. With those views of the church now 
generally accepted, this division seems likely to be per- 
petuated through all the future, with all the evil conse- 
quences which usually spring from such a division. If 
the church in its corporate capacity is charged with 
the duty of guarding the Lord's Supper, and excluding 
from it all who are disloyal to the Master, must it not 
regard as disloyal those who refuse to submit to the 
rite of baptism according to his command ? Can per- 
sons who have in no otherwise been baptized than by 
sprinkling in infancy be regarded as giving evidence of 
loyalty ? But if the power of the keys has been aban- 
doned, if men approach the Lord's Supper only by the 
invitation of the Master, and accountable to him alone 
for the sincerity of their faith and love, the sectarian 
line which divides Congregational and Baptist churches 
will disappear. Close communion will no longer exist 
on either side. The whole question will be referred on 
both sides, not to the authority of the church in its 
corporate capacity, but to individual conscience and 
conviction, and to the final adjudication of the one Head 
of the church universal. In neither church will the 
Lord's Supper be any longer employed as an instrument 
for enforcing any views or practices in respect to the 
rite of baptism. That community will be divided by a 



WHAT IS THE REMEDY? 30I 

sectarian line no longer. If both churches are strong, 
and both houses of worship are needed for the accom- 
modation of the people, both organizations may be 
retained because the general good seems to require it. 
But if they are weak and the support of two congrega- 
tions is burdensome, no insuperable obstacle will exist 
in the way of uniting them in one. In either case the 
way has been prepared for the complete and harmonious 
co-operation of that whole community in every good 
Christian enterprise. The schism has been healed, and 
they are one in Christ as they should be. 

If the same change should take place in all Congre- 
gational and Baptist churches in respect to their views 
of this matter, the line which has so long divided these 
two sects, and often with very bitter consequences, 
would everywhere fade out and no longer be traceable. 
If certain Congregational churches were still called 
Baptist, that word would have lost its sectarian signifi- 
cation, and only retain a historic meaning. Sparse 
populations with scanty resources would no longer be 
burdened with the necessity of supporting two churches 
where one could do the work much better. There 
would no longer be any motive for maintaining separate 
colleges, theological seminaries, missionary organiza- 
tions, periodical publications and religious literatures. 
These would all be things of the past, remembered 
with sorrow, mingled however with grateful joy for our 
deliverance from them. Ephraim would no longer 
envy Judah, nor Judah vex Ephraim. 

It may be said in reply to this, that this result might 
have been attained without relinquishing the corporate 
guardianship of the church over the Lord's Supper, that 
t 1 e principle might have been adopted, that in the exer- 
cise of that guardianship, none should be excluded ex- 
cept those who failed to furnish evidence of being true 



302 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

disciples of Christ. To this suggestion I make two 
replies. First, I refuse to forget that the real question 
at issue is whether the Founder of the church intended to 
commit such a guardianship of the Lord's Supper to the 
church in its corporate capacity. Till it can be shown that 
he did, I must refuse to co-operate in establishing such a 
guardianship from considerations of expediency without 
his authority. Second, the line which it is proposed to 
draw is too tenuous and indefinite to be distinctly dis- 
cerned and effectually guarded by any human tribunal. 
If the church is by corporate and judicial action to 
exclude from the Lord's Supper all who fail to give 
evidence of being true disciples of Christ, this rule will 
receive as many different interpretations as there are 
different tribunals, or rather as there are different cases 
to which it is to be applied. Our judgments as to what 
constitutes evidence of true discipleship differ very 
widely, according to the varying moods of feeling we 
may happen to be in, and the different standpoints we 
may occupy. In times of intense controversy, we judge 
very severely of everything which stands opposed to us, 
and churches are tempted to erect their own opinions 
on points at issue into tests of communion. Thus the 
embittered parties of one generation become the per- 
manent and no less embittered sects of generations that 
come after. This is not theory but historic fact. The 
human mind cannot be relied on wisely and righteously 
to apply such a principle. 

This perhaps is a suitable place to fulfil an assurance 
which was given to the reader in a former chapter, that 
the objection should be fairly met, that the same sol- 
vent which it is proposed to apply to sect would dissolve 
the church also. It is perhaps not too much to assume, 
that the candid reader is convinced that the remedy 
proposed would heal the schism about baptism which 



WHAT IS THE REMEDY ? 303 

has existed for generations among Congregationalists. 
Can he show that it has any tendency whatever to 
weaken one of the social ties which bind the disciples 
of Christ together ? Has it taken from the church any- 
thing but the jDOwer to tyrannize over the consciences 
of individual disciples? That power the Protestant 
churches carried along with them when they separated 
from Rome, and have adhered to it and fondly cher- 
ished it as though it were an indispensable bond of 
union. It is a grievous delusion. It has never been a 
bond of union, but a force of repulsion, a wedge of 
division. The whole pathway of Protestant church his- 
tory is thickly strewn with the wrecks it has caused. In 
our efforts to find a remedy for sect, we have proposed 
to deprive the church of this power, by proving that the 
exercise of it is a usurpation. But in proving that, we 
do not break or weaken one of all the attractive forces 
which tend to bind the disciples of Christ together in 
perpetual and universal fraternity. We have not denied 
catholicity, but only shown that the catholicitj of the 
church of God is not political and organic, but moral and 
spiritual. The church is not held together by govern- 
ments administered by human hands, by judicial decrees 
and penal sanctions, but by faith in Christ and the free, 
spontaneous attractions of his love. The solvent which 
it is proposed to apply to sect acts only on the baser 
and more destructible materials which are found in the 
compound, while over the pure gold of truth and love 
it has no power at all. 

Perhaps some may still feel an apprehension, that 
though, the remedy proposed may not directly attack 
the purely moral and spiritual forces which bind Chris- 
tians together, it does weaken and perhaps destroy all 
motives and inducements to any organic and visible 
church. It has already been shown that the only 



304 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

organic form in which Christianity did manifest itself in 
apostolic times was that of the local church, and I have 
certainly no unwillingness to admit that it is only 
through the power of the keys that any other organiza- 
tion of the church than the local has been rendered 
possible in any subsequent age. Is it then contended 
that without the power of the keys local churches also 
become impossible ? Does the objector mean to assume, 
that the churches founded by the apostles did exercise 
that power, that the exercise of it was the only pur- 
pose for which they existed, and that without it their 
existence, even ia apostolic times, would have been 
impossible ? If he does not mean this, his objection is 
obviously of no validity. If he does mean it, he must 
prove hit assertions. This he will find a very difficult 
undertaking. If this was the condition of the possible 
existence of the churches founded by the apostles, and 
the sole object for which they existed, i' i>s strange 
indeed that the apostolic writings contain no proof that 
the power of the keys was known to those churches. 
If there was another object for which those churches 
existed, that object would have furnished the occasion 
of their existence, and that occasion would be as lasting 
as the church of God on earth. 

There was'and is and always will be such an occasion 
wherever Christian faith and love exist. It will always 
and everywhere be true as it was in the times of the 
apostles, that men dwelling together in the same com- 
munities, having a common faith in Jesus Christ, and 
common Christian aims and hopes, will be impelled by 
very strong social instincts to unite themselves together 
in permanent societies, not for the purpose of lording it 
over individual conscience, but for mutual sympathy, 
co-operation, edification and helpfulness. These social 
instincts are the forces which in every age have united 



WHAT IS THE REMEDY ? 305 

Christians together in the local church, wherever these 
instincts have not been counteracted by the exercise of 
usurped ecclesiastical power. 

To assert that men will not join the local church if 
they are permitted to participate in the Lord's Supper, 
without membership in it, is not only gratuitous, but in 
direct opposition to evidence the most abundant and 
decisive. I believe the largest Protestant Church in 
Christendom is that of Mr. Spurgeon, in London. No 
church can be found the members of which are drawn 
together by stronger or more enduring ties ; yet in that 
church access to the Lord's table is independent of 
membership in it or any other church. Every commu- 
nicant approaches the fable only as a disciple of Christ, 
acting on his own individual responsibility to God. The 
rites of baptism and the Lord's Supper are regarded 
and treated as belonging, not to the organized local 
church, but to the church inorganic and universal. 
Many examples may be adduced in this country in 
which the same experiment has been tried for many 
years with the same results. 

It may still seem to some to require further proof that 
this remedy is really of universal application. It has 
been shown to be applicable to the most centralized 
and compact, and to one of the least compacted of ex- 
isting sectarian combinations. But it may still be 
doubted by some, whether there are not intermediate 
forms to which it would be found inapplicable. There 
is a class of writers who have certainly done much to 
set this whole subject in a clear light, whose views of 
the particular matter now to be considered seem open 
to grave criticism. 1 They rightly affirm that in our 

1 I refer particularly to Archbishop Whately's Kingdom of Christ 
Delineated, and G. A. Jacob's Ecclesiastical Polity of the New 
Testament. 



306 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

efforts to construct the church, we must exclude noth- 
ing which is required, and include nothing which is for- 
bidden by Christ and the apostles. But they also tell 
us that there are many matters touching the organiza- 
tion and government of the church, respecting which 
the apostolic records are silent. No instructions are 
given. Respecting these, we are told that Christian 
people are left to their own discretion, and may'freely 
use their own taste and judgment. Thus they seem to 
teach that, as the judgment of different individuals and 
different groups of individuals may be very unlike in 
reference to such matters, widely diverse constitutions 
of the church may coexist among the same people, and 
may all be equally legitimate, and equally acceptable to 
the Master. This conclusion can only be accepted un- 
der very important limitations, and with very careful 
distinctions. 

It cannot be denied that there are cases in which the 
absence of any command or prohibition would leave a 
Christian people at liberty to adopt such social arrange- 
ments as might seem expedient or necessary. There 
are no direct instructions anywhere that Christians 
should unite in organized societies. But the apostles 
have set us an example which teaches us, that though 
such organizations are not commanded, they are expe- 
dient and proper. They were actually entered into, 
wherever converts were made by apostolic preaching. 
We are not told in any direct command, what officers 
should be appointed in particular churches, or what 
functions they should perform. Yet we find that there 
were officers in those churches, though it is not possible 
to determine how m:ny, or what were their functions. 
Does it then follow that any company of persons pro- 
fessing to be Christians may organize a church wherever 
they please, without regard to any Christian organiza 



WHAT IS THE REMEDY? 307 

tions already existing, and upon any constitution which 
may suit their fancy ? When they have so constituted 
the church, will its title be good to all the sacredness 
and all the moral authority which belongs to the church 
of Christ? Especially, may such a voluntary society 
assume the guardianship of the Lord's Supper, and use 
it as the principal instrument of government ? If so, to 
seek a remedy for sect is a waste of time and labor. 
According to these principles, sect was intended to be 
the normal condition of Christian society. If these 
conclusions are to be accepted, to what purpose have 
such men as Archbishop Whately and G. A. Jacob em- 
ployed themselves, in reconstructing the polity of the 
apostolic churches ? It may be rendered quite plain 
that the apostles constructed churches according to a 
certain model, but it would not follow that we are to 
conform to that model. They built according to their 
wisdom and discretion. We are equally at liberty to 
use our own judgment. By laying down such a prin- 
ciple as that just stated, these men have rendered their 
own work quite worthless, except for rebuking the 
exclusiveness of any who think their form of the church 
is holier or better than any other. If we accept their 
view of this matter, the influence of what they have 
written will be to promote general indifferentism in rela- 
tion to the whole subject of sect and church polity. 
One polity will be esteemed just as good and legitimate 
as another. Men will be encouraged lazily to adhere to 
the sect of their fathers, or that into which accident may 
have thrown them ; and sectarian anarchy will go on 
perpetually weakening and disgracing the church of 
God. 

There can hardly be any danger of falling into error 
by assuming, that this principle must be subject to very 
important limitations. One limitation is obvious at a 



30S THE KEYS OF SECT. 

glance. That which is nowhere forbidden in words 
may yet be forbidden in a very decisive manner, by the 
known aim and spirit of the institution, and by general 
principles clearly inculcated. There is not anywhere a 
verbal prohibition of the exercise of the power of the 
keys. Neither is it anywhere commanded. It is one 
of the omissions of the New Testament. Does it hence 
follow, that in constructing the church we are at liberty 
so to assume that power, as to make it the chief instru- 
ment of church government and discipline ? It has 
been already abundantly shown, that by that very 
assumption the church was corrupted and enslaved for 
centuries, and that the principle is contradictory to the 
aim and spirit of the church and of Christianity itself. 
Is not this a sufficient prohibition ? Is it not stronger 
even than a direct prohibition in words ? Its true 
import is, that such a constitution of the church is so 
foreign to its nature and spirit, that it is not for one 
moment to be thought of. If Jesus had intended such 
a church government, he would have instituted and 
required it. And yet to institute and require it, was to 
nullify his whole work, and contradict the essential aim 
and spirit of his mission. 

We cannot then, after having been driven to the 
necessity of relinquishing the power of the keys as a 
power divinely conferred for the government of the 
church, restore it again on the plea that, though not 
specifically granted, it is nowhere directly forbidden. 
It is indirectly forbidden, by the general aim and spirit 
of Christianity, as illustrated by centuries of mournful 
experience. I see no reason to fear that any of those 
forms of organization which have divided Christendom 
for centuries could maintain their separate existence for 
a single century, after being deprived of it. To every 
one of them it is the instrument of government to the 



WHAT IS THE REMEDY ? ?°9 

use of which they resort in the last extremity ; or to 
change the figure, it is the nucleus around which the 
whole system of government is constructed. Take it 
away, and they will inevitably fall to pieces ; and the 
Christian people that compose them will be left free to 
obey those moral affinities of faith and love, which tend 
t© draw all Christian disciples into a universal spiritual 
brotherhood. 

There may still be a question whether the attractions 
of the forms and the liturgy and the clerical vestments 
of the Anglican and Papal churches, or the standards 
and catechisms of the Presbyterian churches, or the 
itinerant ministry of the Methodist Episcopal Church 
may not have in them sufficient vital force to sustain 
these organizations in separate existence, after the 
power of the keys shall have been abandoned. I 
prefer to discuss this question in another place, where 
each of these forms of church organization will be 
separately considered. 

There is however another limitation of the principle, 
that in the constitution of the church we are at liberty 
to adopt whatever is not prohibited, which is of a general 
character, and should therefore be considered in this 
place. It is, that whatever liberty of choice a group of 
Christians worshipping together may have in respect to 
things which are neither required nor forbidden, they have 
no right to assume any legislative powers, by the exer- 
cise of which they will deprive other Christian people of 
the same liberty. For example, it may be quite right that 
the pastor of a particular worshipping assembly should 
write out the prayers he uses in conducting public wor- 
ship, and read them from his manuscript, or that he 
should read them from a printed volume. Such a 
method may suit the judgment of the pastor and be 
agreeable to the people. But if that 



3IO THE KEYS OF SECT. 

enacts a law, that the pastor shall use a prescribed form 
in prayer, it injuriously and wrongfully limits the pastor's 
liberty of public teaching, and usurps authority which it 
never received from the Master. 

Still more if a confederation is formed of many con- 
gregations, and a body composed of officers or repre- 
sentatives of those congregations enacts a law that all 
the congregations so confederated shall use in public 
worship only a prescribed form of words, a great wrong 
is clone. The Lord's people are deprived of that liberty 
of worship which is the gift of God to all. The repre- 
sentatives of twenty congregations met in deliberative 
assembly can have no right to dictate to one congrega- 
tion the words in which only it shall approach to God. 
That congregation may know that it has common wants 
and social longings which those words do not express, 
and to forbid their giving social utterance before God to 
those common longings of many hearts, is a high- 
handed usurpation. It is a violation of that freedom 
of the social instincts of devout men, out of which the 
organization of particular congregations for the worship 
of God springs. 

Such a confederation of churches, or any assembly of 
church officials exercising such powers over particular 
Christian congregations, is sure sooner or later to be 
a source of strife, debate, division and anarchy. It 
may be said, and said truly, that a prayer read from a 
book is just as acceptable to God as one expressed in 
the words of the moment without the book, and that 
therefore it must be immaterial whether the prayer is 
offered in one form or the other. Very true, and for 
that very reason it is a tyrannical usurpation for any 
man or any assembly of church officials to dictate to a 
worshipping congregation, which of these forms it shall 
adopt ; or in other words to make that a matter of 



WHAT IS THE REMEDY? 31I 

ecclesiastical law, which God left free to the discretion 
of his people. This prirfciple is of universal applica- 
tion. All ecclesiastical legislation in respect to things 
neither commanded nor forbidden is high-handed spir- 
itual tyranny. It is a usurpation of authority over 
matters which the Lord has left free to the sound dis- 
cretion of his people. When this principle is universally 
admitted, sect will be of the number of the things that 
were but are not. 

The question may still arise whether diversities of 
opinion on matters of this sort may not after all produce 
divisions of particular local churches. It must un- 
doubtedly be admitted that such divisions are among 
the things that are possible. But let us thank God 
that they are only possible, not probable. When churchly 
and priestly power are quite withdrawn from such ques- 
tions, the spirit of Christian forbearance and charity 
will seldom fail to dispose of them in a manner honor- 
able to the Christian brotherhood. If, in occasional 
instances, such should not be the fact, the resulting 
divisions would be only local and temporary, and the 
wounds they would cause would be soundly healed by 
the growth of Christian charity. It is only by the power 
of the keys that organized churches have ever been 
able to convert matters which the Lord left to wise and 
enlightened discretion, into those permanent and un- 
changing ecclesiastical enactments, by which sects main- 
tain their separate existence from generation to genera- 
tion. 

Perhaps to some of my readers I shall seem, both in 
this chapter and in that on the origin of the sects of 
modern Christendom, to have entirely overlooked the 
gravest cause of the evil. That cause it will perhaps 
be said lies back of all questions of organization and 
polity, in the great moral depravity of human nature 



312 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

itself, and in the low and very imperfect style of Chris- 
tian character which prevails in the church itself. I 
often hear it asserted that if the church in all its 
branches was composed of Christ-like men and women, 
it would matter little what its constitution might be. 
Christian people would be so thoroughly joined in heart, 
that their division into sects could do little harm. The 
whole cause of the mischief, it is said, is the sectarian 
spirit, and changing the constitution of the church would 
do little good. 

This seems plausible, and by many is accepted as 
eminently wise and pious. But it is surely fallacious. 
As well might it have been said in our terrible conflict 
with African slavery, The system is well enough, if only 
we had good men and women to work it. The system 
was not well enough. It powerfully tended to convert 
even good men and women into selfish and cruel tyrants. 
It is so with sect. It will not let Christian people who 
really do love the brethren, manifest their love in mutual 
confidence and co-operation for the kingdom of Christ. 
It separates them from each other by walls of partition, 
which hinder mutual acquaintance, and obstruct the 
flow of Christian sympathy, and produce an isolation 
which fills their minds with the notion that they have 
rival religious interests to which they attach much of 
the sacredness which belongs to the gospel itself. We 
fervently love those with whom we habitually co-operate 
in endeavors to promote the most cherished ends, and 
are very strongly tempted to hate those who are counter- 
working our sacred religious plans and efforts. Sect 
constantly throws the best- men into such false relations 
to each other, and tempts them to regard each other as 
enemies for Christ's sake, not friends. He who does 
not know that this is the practical working of sect knows 
nothing of the subject. 



WHAT IS THE REMEDY? 313 

Men of the purest intentions are placed in a position 
so false that they are made to believe, that the defence 
and enlargement of their sect is indispensable to the 
prosperity of the kingdom of Christ, and are driven by 
the stress of what seems to them "denominational 
necessity " to do things which they would scorn to do 
for their own private interests. The sacredness of the 
end justifies the means, and they are far less scrupu- 
lously conscientious in their religious life than in their 
common secular business. The constitution of the 
church, it is said, is well enough, if only we had a satis- 
factory style of Christian character ; yet this very vicious 
constitution of the church poisons the moral atmosphere 
of Christendom with a baleful miasma, from the morbid 
influence of which none can escape. Beings of angelic 
wisdom and purity might be able to pass their lives 
under such conditions without suffering much harm, but 
it is certain few men are wise and strong enough to 
resist such temptations. If indeed it is true, which I 
doubt not, that the style of character in the Christian 
church has great need to be elevated and improved, in 
order that she may accomplish her mission in the 
world, then is it indispensable that these Pontine 
marshes in which she dwells should be so thoroughly 
drained, that she may breathe the pure air of the king- 
dom of heaven. 

I do not by any means claim that the reform advo- 
cated in these pages will at once secure the complete 
realization of the divine conception. Those selfish and 
hateful passions which in greater or less degree mar all 
the associations of men, will intrude themselves into the 
church in every possible mode of organization, disturb 
its peace and impair its purity and power. The enemy 
will still sow tares among the wheat, and they will not 
be separated from it till the time of the harvest. Their 



314 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

presence will never be harmless ; bitter strifes and local 
divisions will still take place, and bring reproach upon 
the Christian name. But they will be only local, and will 
endure only till the local irritation that produced them 
has passed away. Any such parcelling out of the fol- 
lowers of Christ under permanent rival governments 
coextensive with the limits of Christendom, as that 
which we witness, will become and forever remain im- 
possible. A great permanent cause of corruption and 
weakness in the church of God will have been effectu- 
ally removed. 



CHURCH DISCIPLINE. '315 



CHAPTER V. 

CHURCH DISCIPLINE. 

It must not be supposed that in the previous discus- 
sion I have been unmindful of an objection which has 
no doubt been constantly in the minds of many readers, 
— that if this view of the church prevails, there is an end 
of all church discipline. It has not been overlooked 
for a moment, but only deferred till the proper place 
for considering it should be reached. It will doubtless 
be regarded by many as an insuperable objection against 
the remedy for sect which was proposed in a previous 
chapter. They will seem to themselves to reason with 
unanswerable conclusiveness when they say, Let us bear 
all the evils of sect rather than give up the discipline 
of our churches. So any Christian man would say, if 
by church discipline is meant that system of moral and 
spiritual nurture which the Founder of the church 
meant to institute for the perfecting of the saints. But 
a more careful examination of the subject may show, 
not only that the application of that remedy will not 
destroy the discipline of the church, but that it is abso- 
lutely necessary to its successful application and use. 

In considering this subject our first inquiry must 
respect the nature and aim of church discipline. If we 
derive our notions of the subject from church history, 
our definition of church discipline must be, — the exer- 
tion of ecclesiastical authority, to guard the Lord's 



316 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

Supper from being profaned by the intrusion of un- 
worthy participants, and to punish those who are guilty 
of violating moral duty or ecclesiastical law, by depriv- 
ing them of the privilege of participating in that rite. 
If any one is disposed to call in question the justness 
of this statement, I have only to refer him to the 
standard literature of the question. That it is a true 
account of the spirit and import of discipline in the 
papal church surely needs no argument to prove. That 
the same is true in the Protestant churches of the 
Reformation, is certainly no less obvious. If any one 
will consult the chapter on this subject in Calvin's 
Institutes, 1 he will find no reason whatever to doubt as 
to his view of the matter. He uses the " power of the 
keys." He assumes it to be the chief instrument of 
church government. He speaks of the punishments to 
be inflicted by the church on the guilty, and argues 
that they should be meted out according to the degree 
of criminality. There is no reason to suppose that his 
views of the subject differed from those generally held 
in the reformed churches, or that those churches have 
ever renounced them. Many of us know well that sub- 
stantially the same view of the subject has been tena- 
ciously held in our own churches, and in our own times, 
and have vivid and painful memories of having seen 
them applied in practice. It may be true that in the 
Episcopal churches of Great Britain and the United 
States, church discipline has for generations scarcely 
existed. But it is not because the principle has been 
abandoned or renounced, but only because it has been 
neglected, and has thus passed into disuse. There is 
no valid ground for calling in question the definition 
above given of church discipline historically considered. 

1 Calvin's Institutes, Book IV., Chap. XII. 



CHURCH DISCIPLINE. 317 

. When it is objected that the view of the church put 
forth in these pages will put an end to such church 
discipline as is described by this definition, the charge 
will be at once admitted. But it will be maintained 
that so far is this from being a valid objection, that such 
church discipline has been the corrupter of the church 
for ages, and that it must be brought to an end, in 
order that the church of Christ may ever exert its 
legitimate influence in the world. 

Two almost omnipresent causes have already ren- 
dered the practical exercise of such church discipline 
nearly impossible, in all the Protestant churches. These 
two causes are, — a general revulsion of feeling through- 
out Christendom against it as contradictory to the pre- 
vailing spirit of Christianity, — and the multiplication of 
sects, nullifying the discipline of each other by their 
mutual rivalries. It is the sorrowful complaint of thou- 
sands in our churches that church discipline has become 
obsolete. The influence of these two causes in produ- 
cing this result deserves to be considered. 

As to the first, little need be said. The appeal is not 
to argument, but to experience, and to the moral senti- 
ments and affections of devout men and women every- 
where. Doubtless there are cases of flagrant immorality 
in members of the church, in which the proof is of such 
a character as to leave no possibility of doubt of the 
guilt of the accused, in respect to which the disciplinary 
process can be pushed to the final step of excommuni- 
cation, without producing any disturbance of the har- 
mony and good feeling which should pervade the whole 
social life of a Christian church. But when the offence 
charged is less enormous, or the proof not such as to 
command absolute or universal assent, one might appeal 
with great confidence to the experience of all Christian 
people, as to the baleful influence of church discipline 



310 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

as ordinarily conducted. The probable occurrence of 
it is looked forward to with a painful dread, which 
words can but inadequately express. The spirit of 
litigation which is likely to be elicited, the intensely 
excited parties that are likely to be formed, the hatreds 
that are likely to be engendered and perpetuated, and 
the unfavorable impression likely to be made on the 
community by the seemingly harsh and denunciatory 
character of the final sentence of excommunication, 
with all the historic associations that cluster around 
that word, or even if those associations are not taken 
into the account, by the debarring of one deemed a 
brother or a sister from participation in a divinely 
appointed religious rite, by the exercise of church au- 
thority, — all this and much more will be sure to come 
into the remembrance of all who have had much experi- 
ence of such proceedings, and cause the probable recur- 
rence of them to be regarded with painful apprehension 
and alarm. In the present and probable future condi- 
tion of religious and social sentiment, nothing of the 
kind will be attempted, except in circumstances of the 
most urgent necessity, and in cases so plain as to forbid 
any expectation of the occurrence of a conflict in respect 
to them. Disciplinary processes will be very rarely 
resorted to, and moral delinquencies in members of the 
church will be overlooked and neglected, in which the 
reputation of the church for moral purity will be greatly 
injured, and religion itself deeply disgraced. 

The harshness of the word "excommunication" is 
not entirely historic in its origin. It has not come 
entirely from the horrid ecclesiastical tyranny of past 
ages, or from the still retained anathemas of the 
papal church. It is partly caused by the nature of 
the case and the transaction. If we view this sub- 
ject from the standpoint of Christianity, if we believe 



CHURCH DISCIPLINE. 319 

that Jesus is the Messiah of God crucified for the sins 
of the world, if in prophetic anticipation of that cruci- 
fixion, he instituted this rite, and required all who 
believe in him for salvation to unite in the observance 
of it, then is it an exceedingly grave proceeding when 
the church, composed of frail and errring men, (and all 
men are frail and erring,) pronounces on one of its 
members a judicial sentence of perpetual exclusion 
from the privilege of participating in it. In the nature 
of the case the community will always regard such a 
sentence as harsh, except when it is pronounced against 
persons notoriously guilty of very flagrant crimes. 
Whenever such a sentence is proclaimed in any modern 
community, it may well be anticipated, that it will create 
heart-burnings and inflict wounds which will not soon 
be healed ; and the more reverence men have for the 
rite, the harsher the proceeding will seem, and the 
greater the shock which it will occasion. If it can be 
shown that Jesus Christ invested his church with such 
an authority, and laid on it such a responsibility, in 
order to protect the sanctity of the rite, and guard 
the honor of his name, then the church must do it, 
however difficult the task, and whatever unpopularity 
she may incur in the doing of it. But if Christ has 
made no such grant of authority, it would surely be 
wise for the church to abstain from the exercise of a 
function so difficult and delicate. Of one thing we may 
easily render ourselves quite sure by a little reflection. 
The sentence of excommunication will hereafter be 
very rarely pronounced from Protestant pulpits. Prot- 
estant churches recognize the obligation of doinsr that 
which experience shows they cannot do. Nobody will 
be excommunicated except those who have already 
excommunicated themselves by their infamous lives. 
The other cause which renders discipline impossible 



320 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

is the multiplication of sects, and their rivalries with 
each other. The theory of the subject is, that every 
true church of Christ is an ecclesiastical court, empow- 
ered by the Master to receive charges against any com- 
municant, hear and weigh evidence, and judicially to 
decide whether the chorge is proved, and, if the accused 
is found guilty, pass sentence of excommunication ujDon 
him, unless the condemned person shows satisfactory 
evidence of repentance. But the working of this theory 
is sadly obstructed by the fact that, however numerous 
the sects in a community, each church of whatever 
sect is a court of Jesus Christ in presence of every 
other, and with independent jurisdiction. There is con- 
stant reason to apprehend, that the sentence of one 
court will be set aside and treated as a nullity by the 
equally valid decisions of another court just over the 
way. The community at large has just as much respect 
for one of these tribunals as for the other. Discipline 
is constantly liable to be wholly neutralized, and the 
whole proceeding to be rendered abortive, and in the eyes 
of the community contemptible. What sort of a gov- 
ernment of the church of Christ must that be, in which 
in every little community, there are several rival courts 
of Jesus Christ, each with independent jurisdiction ? 
Each sect may in this way govern itself in some sort, 
but by such an arrangement the government of the one 
church of Jesus Christ is rendered impossible. It is 
not government but anarchy. 

This evil is greatly aggravated by the sharp rivalries 
between churches belonging to different sects, for the in- 
crease of their numbers and their revenues. Persons 
who find themselves or their friends annoyed and 
harassed by the discipline to which they are or have 
been or are likely to be subjected, will easily escape 
the annoyance by withdrawing from such a church, and 



CHURCH DISCIPLINE. 32 I 

connecting themselves with another, in which perhaps 
discipline is less stringent, or where they have reason 
to suppose their own personal importance will be a 
protection against its exercise. Or they will withdraw 
from the church altogether, and occupy a position out- 
side its pale ; and it cannot be denied, that the respect 
of the community for the church and its discipline has 
been so much impaired by these rivalries of sect, that 
such a position may be occupied with little danger of 
suffering any loss of respectability and social considera- 
tion. There is no man that reflects on the social 
scenery around him, who will not perceive, that this 
picture is true to life, and that it indicates a state of 
public opinion in which any exercise of what is com- 
monly called " church discipline " is quite impossible. 
There are very many in our churches who deeply de- 
plore and severely censure this decay of discipline, as a 
sad indication of the degeneracy of the times ; but the 
very persons who utter these complaints have not them- 
selves the courage to face the difficulties which present 
themselves, to initiate disciplinary processes, and push 
them to the final issue. 

If then it is an objection to the doctrines of the 
church set forth in these pages, that their adoption 
would put an end to our traditionary church discipline, 
it should not be forgotten, that the influence which they 
might exert in this respect has already been anticipated 
by a wide-spread conviction that such an exercise of dis- 
cipline is contrary to the aim and spirit of the gospel, and 
injurious to the proper influence of the Christian reli- 
gion ; and that that very multiplication of sects which I 
at least deplore, renders the exercise of any discipline 
at all in the churches nearly impossible. No well- 
informed Christian man will deny, that at the present 
time all discipline of the church of Christ is rapidly 



32 2 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

falling into hopeless decay, and something must be 
done to save it from utter extinction. 

It is not only admitted but maintained, that what is 
commonly called " church discipline " does depend pri- 
marily and chiefly on the power of the keys, and that 
that power is a usurpation in the household of God, 
which should be utterly abolished. It is therefore 
undeniably true, that if the doctrines of this book are 
generally accepted, such church discipline will entirely 
and forever cease ; not merely as now, because it is 
found to be impracticable, but because it is seen to be 
contradictory to the spirit of the gospel. What then ? 
Is this the only possible discipline of the church of 
God ? If this is given up must all church discipline 
be forever abandoned ? It now remains to be shown, 
that this is so far from being the truth, that the entire 
abandonment of this conception of the subject is an 
indispensable condition of restoring to the church the 
true discipline of Jesus and the apostles. The disci- 
pline of which I have thus far spoken is directly and 
flagrantly in contradiction to that which Jesus clearly 
indicated his intention to establish for the spiritual 
edification of his people. To that the reader's attention 
must now be invited. 

The most comprehensive statement which can be 
made of the church discipline of the Scriptures is, that 
its aim is, not to punish the guilty, not to protect the 
Lord's Supper from profanation, not even to put un- 
worthy members out of the church, but to reclaim, 
restore and save those who fall into sin. There is no 
hint that Jesus ever did commit to the church in its cor- 
porate capacity the function of detecting and punishing 
crime. No one can for a moment think so, who will 
reflect on the spirit of the whole Christian scheme. 
Christ did not come to condemn, but to reclaim and to 



CHURCH DISCIPLINE. 323 

save. The whole design and aim of the first coming of 
the Messiah was to call sinners to repentance. He 
established his kingdom in the world to co-operate with 
him in that one design of his mission. He is to come 
again, to judgment. But that judgment will be without 
any intervention of any fallible human tribunal. In it 
the whole multitude of the redeemed will indeed be 
joined with him. But it will not be by acting as a 
human tribunal, with all the infirmities and liabilities to 
error which pertain to all which is human and earthly, 
but by the united manifestation of that truth of God, 
according to which that judgment will proceed. The 
proposition that Jesus Christ committed to his church 
in its earthly and human organization the function of 
detecting and punishing sin is, in view of the abundant 
declarations which he made in respect to the design of 
his coining, in the highest degree improbable and in- 
credible. When the brotherhood of a particular church, 
or a church officer no matter how high in station, or a 
board of church officers no matter how exalted in titles 
and dignities, assumes to occupy the judgment-seat for 
the purpose of detecting and condemning the guilty, 
and sentencing him to appropriate punishment, we may 
be sure that a function has been usurped which Jesus 
never conferred. God has indeed committed all judg- 
ment to the Son ; but the Son will exercise it in his own 
person, and has never committed it to any community 
of frail and fallible men. 

If I am here met*by the papal interpretation, that 
Jesus promised to remove the fallibility of his church 
by his own personal presence, I answer, that a promise 
to be with his people is far enough from a promise to 
invest them either with personal or corporate or official 
infallibility. It is a promise to be at hand to help 
them in all their struggles and conflicts, and to give 



324 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

them the ultimate victory. He was with Peter and 
praying for him, when he denied his Lord. Still more 
is this promise far removed from securing infallibility 
to the church, when she assumes the exercise of a func- 
tion never committed to her by the Master. It is a 
previous question which must be judged of by inde- 
pendent evidence, whether Christ ever intimated an 
intention to commit to the church the function of judg- 
ment and punishment. There is no hint or intimation 
that he did, and the strongest possible evidence in the 
spirit and aim of the Messianic mission, that he did not. 
Nothing therefore can be more groundless than the 
claim of a divine promise of infallibility in the perform- 
ance of it. An interpretation so loose, so unsupported 
by evidence, can never sustain the huge superstructure 
which men have sought to rear upon it. 

Nor is there any intimation that Jesus instituted a 
system of police, to protect the Lord's Supper from 
profanation by the participation of unworthy persons in 
it. There is not only an entire absence of any specific 
provision for such a police court, but such an institution 
would be exceedingly foreign to the general spirit of 
Christianity. Jesus came to the world with no weapon 
either of defence or aggression, but the word of the 
Lord. That is the only sword of the Spirit. On it 
alone he relied for his own protection, and he left his 
church and his gospel in the world with no other armor 
either offensive or defensive. The claim that he sur- 
rounded the ceremonies which, he instituted with a 
human guardianship to be administered by human 
hands, is so foreign to the spirit of his whole life as to 
be utterly incredible. Men have devised such a. guar- 
dianship and gloried in the invention ; but it is through 
that very device that these rites have been most fear- 
fully corrupted and profaned for ages. By that very 



CHURCH DISCIPLINE. 325 

device bad men have not only gained access to them, 
but have usurped control over them, and made them 
the instruments of the most terrific spiritual tyranny 
ever imposed upon men. The severest wounds which 
Jesus has ever received in the world have been in this 
house of his friends. It is not on any human tribunal, 
or any police court that Jesus relied for protecting the 
sacred rites of Christianity from profanation. 

Nor can we rely on church courts and judicial pro- 
cesses to prevent the intrusion of bad men into the 
church. Doubtless flagrant cases of wickedness do 
sometimes occur in the church, which impose on her 
the necessity of casting out the offender. But her 
main reliance for the purity of her membership must 
always be on the same word of the Lord. That must 
be the attractive power by which men are drawn to the 
church of God. Penitent believers in Christ alone will 
feel that attractive force. The same word of the Lord 
is the flaming sword pointing every way, to guard the 
tree of life from the intrusion of those who would 
approach it for profane and selfish purposes. If the 
gospel in its primitive purity and power is in the church, 
in the pulpit and in the pews, in its prayers and praises 
and teaching voices, and in the lives of its members, 
impenitent guilt will not be much tempted to intrude 
into it. The moral standard by which it tries all life 
and character will be intolerable to wicked men, who 
are determined to persist in their iniquities. This is 
the power of God by which alone the church can be 
governed, and the purity of its membership be preserved. 
When the gospel goes out of the church, wicked men 
will intrude into it, and make it a den of thieves, all the 
more easily and certainly as it has a strong political 
and judicial organization. 

No judicial processes however organized and pro- 



326 , THE KEYS OF SECT. 

vided for can rid the church of unworthy members. 
Persons openly scandalous and infamous in their lives 
can be cast out, and indeed we may hope generally 
will be. But we are all aware, that there are innumer- 
able modes of sin, so subtle, so well concealed under 
the external forms of decency and propriety, so utterly 
incapable of technical definition, that no tribunal can 
deal with them. They baffle all official or judicial 
sagacity or scrutiny. Yet every one discerns their 
presence and feels their turpitude. They are often so 
mean and hateful, as to render their presence in the 
church and under the garb of devotion a spectacle dis- 
gusting to behold, disgraceful to the Christian brother- 
hood, and a reproach to our religion. It is by such 
forms of sin rather than by crimes which can be techni- 
cally defined, that the church is chiefly dishonored. Yet 
in the organic disciplinary processes of the church 
under any of its forms, there can be no protection 
against such cases. No judicial processes can reach 
them. It is to be hoped such men may be driven out of 
the church, or repelled from entering it, by the dazzling 
brightness of the truth of God, but in no other way can 
she be rid of them. The more practical knowledge one 
has of the subject, the more readily will he admit, that 
it -is chiefly by the presence of such unworthy members 
that the church is corrupted and disgraced. There is 
no occasion to wonder that when, in the parable of the 
tares of the field, the servants said to the householder, 
"Wilt thou that we go and gather them up?" He 
answered, " Nay, lest while ye gather up the tares, ye 
root up also the wheat with them." The attempt to 
put such sinners out of the church by discipline would 
lead to contentions and litigations and bitterness, which 
would be eminently hurtful and dangerous to the moral 
purity of all its members. 



CHURCH DISCIPLINE. 327 

The discipline which our Lord established in the 
church is primarily and chiefly reformatory in its char- 
acter ; and therefore in the very nature of the case 
not a judicial process. Who does not know that the 
object of a judicial process is the punishment of the 
guilty, not his reformation ? The aim of Christ's disci- 
pline is identical with that of his own coming, to save 
that which was lost. I must here beg the reader to refer 
again to the directions given by our Lord, how one is 
to proceed when a brother trespasses against him. 1 It 
is also important to call attention to the connection in 
which these directions are given, for such a comparison 
sets the spirit of the whole passage in a very clear light. 
Jesus had just declared that "the Son of man is come 
to save that which was lost," and had most forcibly 
illustrated that saying by the parable of the lost sheep, 
implying that that parable truly represents the whole 
aim of his earthly mission. He immediately adds, 
" Even so it is not the will of your Father which is in 
heaven, that one of these little ones should perish." 
He then proceeds to instruct all individual disciples 
what they are to do, to save from perishing the wrong- 
doing and injurious among their brethren, in those very 
words which have so generally been regarded as the 
formula of judicial church discipline. It is clear from 
the connection in which the words stand, that they are 
an application of the principle that " the Son of man 
came to save that which was lost " ; that the aim of the 
whole proceeding is identical with that of the man, 
having an hundred sheep, going into the wilderness to 
seek one which had gone astray. The whole object 
was to recover and restore that which was lost. 

The lesson which we are taught from the whole pas- 

1 Matt, xviii : 15-20. See Chap. IV., Tart I. 



323 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

sage is, that every individual disciple is to exert him- 
self personally to reclaim his brethren when they fall 
into sin, especially in a case in which he is himself 
injured by the sin ; that he is to seek and is entitled to 
receive the co-operation of his brethren in such an 
effort ; and that when he cannot succeed by his own 
efforts, and the co-operation of a few of his brethren, 
he is to invoke the aid of the whole church. It does 
not mean that he is to bring a formal accusation, " to 
table charges," as it is commonly called, but that he 
shall state the case, and that the one or two who have 
co-operated with him shall give their view of the matter. 
The supposed offender would also have opportunity to 
represent the matter as he sees it. The obvious duty 
c f the church would then be, in such ways as should 
seem best, to persuade either of the parties who should 
seem to have done wrong to repent and make restitu- 
tion, and thus restore harmony with righteousness. 
There is no intimation, that the church is to hold a 
judicial investigation, to hear witnesses, and thus to 
judge, condemn and punish ; but to exert its influence 
to reclaim and restore one who seems to be in error. 
If in this way an erring brother cannot be restored, the 
individual trespassed against is released from further 
responsibility. He has done all he could to bring back 
the sheep that was lost. That which was lost remains 
lost, — a heathen man and a jDublican. 

These words are in perfect harmony with the spirit in 
which every disciple of Christ is to regard and treat 
every other. Christianity is a consistent whole ; one 
aim pervades and characterizes it all, — the coming of 
the Messiah, the founding of the kingdom of heaven, 
and the conduct of every disciple -toward every other. 
All have righteousness as the end, and the word of 
God, the persuasive power of the gospel, as the means 



CHURCH DISCIPLINE. 329 

by which that end is to be attained. Cases are likely 
to arise of sins so flagrant and open offenders so evi- 
dently incorrigible, that the church owes it to the indi- 
vidual sinner to express its disapprobation of his char- 
acter by a solemn act of exclusion from the society, 
" For the destruction of the flesh that the spirit may 
be saved in the clay of the Lord Jesus." Even in these 
cases, primary regard is to be had to the salvation of 
the lost. 

It is a sufficient commendation of this conception of 
church discipline, that it is scriptural, and in harmony 
with the spirit of the whole Christian institution. But 
it is a strong additional consideration in its favor, that 
in a multitude of cases it is likely to prove effectual. 
If undertaken in the spirit of the gospel, it will be suc- 
cessful in reclaiming multitudes who, by the process of 
church litigation, would either retain their standing in 
the church unreclaimed, or be driven from it in bitter- 
ness and hopeless alienation. It will unite members 
of the church in the closest ties of mutual confidence 
and affection ; for there is no other bond of attachment 
which binds human beings so strongly together, as that 
which is produced by the consciousness of having been 
mutual helpers in resisting temptations to evil, in culti- 
vating the virtues of a truly Christian character, and in 
common efforts for the promotion of righteousness in 
the world. To introduce into that discipline the judi- 
cial element, and invest the church in its corporate 
capacity with the function of judging, condemning and 
punishing, always tends to rupture these strong and 
precious bonds of moral affection, and to alienate from 
each other those who ought to be brethren beloved. 

It may seem to some an objection to this view of 
church discipline, that cases would undoubtedly come 
before the church in which it would be impossible to 



S3° THE KEYS OF SECT. 

determine whether individuals were really guilty of sins 
laid to their charge or not. How, it may be asked, is 
the church to proceed in such cases ? I answer, that 
it is to such cases that a truly reformatory church dis- 
cipline is peculiarly adapted. The church is to refer 
that which she does not know to the judgment of God, 
and deal only with what she does know. She is to 
apply the reforming power of the gospel to such symp- 
toms of moral disease as are actually presented, and 
endeavor to restore both parties to moral health and 
soundness. Let her appoint some of her wisest and 
most devout members to confer with the individuals 
complaining and complained of, in the spirit of Christ, 
and to cultivate in them that truly penitent spirit which 
will lead the guilty to confession of their sins, and the 
injured to the forgiveness of injuries. By this process 
the church will be far more likely to arrive at a knowl- 
edge of the whole truth than by any judicial investiga- 
tion ; and she will become acquainted with it to save 
the guilty and not to condemn him. Experience demon- 
strates, that an ecclesiastical court is an exceedingly 
imperfect instrument for the detection of guilt, or the 
vindication of injured innocence. In a country of 
religious liberty, an ecclesiastical court is in the nature 
of the case destitute of the means of conducting a judi- 
cial investigation successfully. It cannot compel l wit- 
nesses to appear and bear testimony, and without that 

1 In some of. the States the law does confer on ecclesiastical tri- 
bunals the power to compel witnesses to attend and to testify. I'ut 
it seems to me that in using such a power, the church contracts an 
alliance with the State which is exceedingly at variance with the 
aim and true position of Christianity in the world. It is a rem- 
nant of that alliance of the civil and ecclesiastical, which our 
fathers unfortunately did not leave behind when they embarked 
for the New World. 



CHURCH DISCIPLINE. 33 1 

power a judicial proceeding is little better than a farce, 
and often exposes the church to contempt. We have 
recent experiences on this subject which ought to sat- 
isfy all men. If Jesus Christ intended the church 
should act as a judicial body, he would have clothed it 
with the powers without which that function cannot be 
performed. In a free country an ecclesiastical court is 
an ecclesiastical absurdity. Let the church then cease 
to lay claim to a function which it is impossible she 
should ever perform, and content herself with applying 
those moral forces which the Master has committed to 
her to the facts that are within her reach. Let her 
admit that her function is to reform and save the guilty, 
and not to detect, condemn and punish crime. 

Bad as the world is, it is not impossible to maintain 
in it such a church discipline as this. By its perfect 
harmony with the spirit of the gospel, it will secure the 
approbation and cordial support of all devout men, and 
win for itself their warmest affection. It will shock the 
tastes and moral sentiments of no right-minded person, 
but will on the contrary secure to the church the homage 
and reverence of mankind. Scarcely anything has done 
so much to deprive the church pi her proper influence 
in the world, as a litigious and punitive discipline. 
Courts of justice may be well adapted to the purpose 
of detecting and punishing crime, but I know not that 
jurists have ever claimed that they have any special 
fitness to promote the reformation of the guilty. They 
were instituted for the former and not for the latter. 
Ecclesiastical courts are unfitted to the ends for which 
the gospel exists in the world, and were therefore 
never instituted by the Founder of the kingdom of 
heaven. 

Sect as it is at present constituted would be a great 
hindrance to this discipline. The rivalries of one sect 



332 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

with another would be a great obstacle in the way 
of an attempt in any church to make faithful applica- 
tion of all the reformatory powers of the gospel' to its 
individual members. Those who in such a church were 
living in the practice of any sin would be under a con- 
stant temptation to escape from the application of those 
reformatory forces to themselves, by seeking a church 
connection in which there would be more toleration of 
sin. But the universal abandonment of judicial disci- 
pline would put an end to sect itself. Whenever the 
church will consent to commit all judgment and all 
government to God, and trust alone in the word of the 
Lord for the formation and perfection of individual 
character and the edification, enlargement and purity 
of the church, sect itself will die, and be known only 
among the sorrowful memories of the past. Govern- 
ment, the usurpation of the prerogative of God is the 
one corruption of the church from which sect originates, 
and when that is abandoned, sect will perish because 
its cause has ceased to exist. The unity of the Holy 
Catholic Church will be restored, when we resign its 
government to its invisible Head, and only seek to 
co-operate with him by putting forth some portion of 
that moral power by which alone he governs. 

The question is very naturally suggested, whether the 
discipline of the church has anything to do with the 
maintenance of sound doctrine. Undoubtedly it has. 
It applies to Christian doctrine just as to every other 
portion of Christian life. Each individual disciple is 
under the same obligation to promote his brother's 
soundness in faith as in conduct, and the methods to 
be pursued are the same in both cases. Individual 
intercourse, the co-operation of brethren sound in faith, 
and when necessary the aid of the church itself, are the 
instruments to be employed. In the use of them, the 



CHURCH DISCIPLINE. $$$ 

question at issue is not whether my brother precisely 
agrees with me in all matters of religious opinion, but 
whether he firmly stands by the faith of Jesus the Christ, 
the Saviour of the world. Doubtless if, as the result 
of such a fraternal comparison of views, it becomes 
apparent that there is an irreconcilable conflict of 
opinion in respect to the essential nature of Christianity, 
the holders of the two opinions will be divided asunder. 
How can two walk together except they be agreed? 
They can no longer continue to be members of one 
society, the sole organic principle of which is a common 
faith in Jesus Christ as the Saviour of the world. 
There is no occasion however to be in the least dis- 
quieted at this result. If any one has supposed that in 
all this discussion I have been trying to find out a 
method by which those who believe in Christ and those 
who deny him can be harmoniously comprehended in 
the same Christian body, they have greatly misunder- 
stood my aim. It is the division of Christian disciples 
into sects which is deplored and is to be remedied, not 
the separation of those who deny Christ from those 
who believe in him. This division will always be both 
desirable and inevitable, as long as there are some who 
do and some who do not believe. 

Such a constitution of the church as is advocated in 
these pages will not only have no tendency to hinder, 
but it will greatly facilitate the separation of believers 
from unbelievers. It has been maintained that the one 
organic principle of the church everywhere is faith in 
Jesus Christ as crucified for the sins of the world and 
risen again. Believers in that Christ are drawn to the 
church, while unbelievers are repelled from it. Under 
our present sect system, this one legitimate organic 
principle of the church is overlaid and often quite con- 
cealed from view, by innumerable unimportant questions 



334 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

of form and ceremony and government, which have no 
real relevancy to the subject, and only tend to divert 
attention from the true issue. Many a man is in this 
or that church, because he likes its form of worship, 
or its government, or its architecture, or its music, or 
the language and diction of its pastor, when he would 
never have been drawn to it by a faith in common with 
its members in Jesus Christ. The doctrines advocated 
in this book tend directly to render the open separation 
between believers and unbelievers more easy, more 
apparent and more inevitable. 

No intelligent Protestant needs at this time to be 
informed, that the different Christian sects known as 
" evangelical " are not to any considerable extent 
divided by theological lines. Their recognized formu- 
laries of doctrine, which have come down to them almost 
unchanged from the times of the reformers, may be 
more or less at variance. But the doctrines of their 
pulpits, their praying circles and their ordinary Chris- 
tian life are identical. He has not been a successful 
observer who does not know, that the latter of these 
expressions of doctrinal belief is not necessarily coinci- 
dent with the former. In every Protestant church in 
Christendom, the ordinary and practical expression of 
religious thought, like every other form of living lan- 
guage, is undergoing constant changes, while the pre- 
scribed formulae remain unchanged from century to 
century. You will often find the former no more 
resembling the latter than the English of the present 
resembles that of Spenser's " Faerie Queene." Many of 
us may regret this discrepancy, but none of us can 
hinder it, even in the language in which we express our 
own practical theology. It was not long ago, that a 
gentleman whose reputation as an unbeliever is at 
least national, in the excitement of debate took from 



CHURCH DISCIPLINE. 335 

his pocket a copy of the New England Primer, to prove 
that the Orthodox of the present time believe in the 
torment of the wicked by literal fire. He would have 
been just as wise if he had quoted Spenser and Chaucer 
as authorities for the English of the present. 

The truth is undeniable that, though the formal creeds 
of the churches differ, the practical expressions of relig- 
ious faith in their pulpits and their common life are to 
a great extent identical. You may find in the same 
village a half-dozen sects with separate organizations, 
strenuously maintained, and yet, whatever their formal 
creeds may be, the same preachers of the gospel of 
Christ may find easy access to all their pulpits, and 
the same evangelic message is equally acceptable in 
them all. The inference is unavoidable, that they are 
not kept in their separation by theological differences, 
but by rival governments. There are at the present 
time no theological obstacles which would seriously 
obstruct the union of the great body of Christian people 
who are regarded as evangelical in faith, in churches 
which should know no bond of union but a common 
belief in our Lord Jesus Christ as the Saviour of the 
world. 



33b - T *E KEYS OF SECT. 



CHAPTER VI. 

OTHER OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. 

No one who considers the vastness and complication 
of the ecclesiastical systems of the present would for a 
moment expect, that the doctrines advocated in this 
work can make their way in Christendom, without en- 
countering great and protracted resistance. Even if 
they were universally admitted to be true, their influ- 
ence would not be sudden and violently revolutionary, 
but gradual and quiet. But they will not be readily 
accepted. Their tendency to undermine all those sys- 
tems of ecclesiastical organization which assume the 
power of the keys will be readily perceived by all 
thoughtful men, and will create a great reluctance to 
receive them. While there is certainly much in the 
ecclesiastical structures of Christendom which is of 
disastrous tendency, those structures are not maintained 
and defended for the most part by bad men with evil 
intentions, but by good men with good intentions, men 
who devoutly believe that the ecclesiastical systems 
which they support are the necessary means of conserv- 
ing and propagating truth and righteousness in the 
world, and that the destruction of them would be most 
disastrous to the interests of true religion. The very 
fact that the doctrines advocated in this work do con- 
fessedly tend to subvert those ecclesiastical systems 
will seem a fatal objection to the acceptance of these 



OTHER OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. 337 

doctrines. Many will regard them as subversive of 
systems which are necessary to the maintenance and 
propagation of Christianity, and therefore subversive 
of Christianity itself, and the resistance offered to them 
will be honest and devout. Such objections are worthy 
cf the most respectful consideration. 

To the adherents of the papal church all this will 
seem not only indirectly but directly subversive of 
religion itself. Take away from the honest adherent 
of the papal church everything which depends for its 
continued existence on the power of the keys, and you 
leave him little which he reverences or values. You 
leave him no universal and infallible church authority, 
no priesthood to administer valid sacraments and 
thereby to render the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the 
cross available for the salvation of individual believers, 
no absolution, no forgiveness of sins, no admission into 
the kingdom of heaven. All these blessings seem to 
him to come along the line of a priestly succession, that 
holds the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and has the 
exclusive power to dispense its blessings to the children 
of men. It might be still true, that Christ died for the 
sins of the world, but the doctrines of this book are 
subversive of that organized church and that priestly 
succession which, according to his belief, furnish the 
only channel along which the blessings purchased by 
his death can flow to mortals. This is the fundamental 
doctrine of organized Catholicity. Men who conscien- 
tiously adhere to this system will defend the doctrine 
of St. Peter's keys as the very essence of Christianity. 
The only question between us and them is whether this 
doctrine is true or false. To answer therefore objec- 
tions coming from this source would be to reiterate the 
whole argument of the previous chapters. If that argu- 
ment is sound, organic Catholicity is a delusion and a 



338 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

chimera, and every attempt to enforce it in practice is 
an ecclesiastical usurpation. No further attention need 
therefore be given to objections from this quarter. 

In the minds of Protestants, objections present them- 
selves under a different aspect. That person can 
hardly be said to be a Protestant who does not sharply 
distinguish between the gospel and church polity, and 
who does not discern, that the gospel may exist in its 
purity under widely differing forms of polity. It may 
almost be said to be an article in the common Protestant 
faith, that the gospel of Christ immeasurably transcends 
in importance any and all questions of mere ecclesiastical 
order. If there are any persons who are classified as 
Protestants, who do not heartily accept this article of 
faith, it may well be suspected that a mistake in classi- 
fication has been made, and it is not improbable that 
sooner or later they will discover the mistake and make 
haste to correct it. It is not improbable, that in the 
Anglican churches, as they now exist in different parts 
of the world, many persons are to be found, and some 
of them of high culture and moral worth, who are thus 
wrongly classified, and many of them are becoming 
painfully conscious of their false position. They do 
believe in a mediating priesthood as the only channel 
of the grace of God to men. They are sacramentarians. 
They do believe that the blessings of salvation come to 
men only through Christian rites duly administered, 
and that such an administration implies a priestly suc- 
cession holding the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and 
they do accept in greater or less degree that ritualistic 
worship which is the logical development of these prin 
ciples. Their practical Christianity consists essentially 
of a mediating priesthood, forming the only channel of 
communication between a crucified Saviour and the 
men for whom he died. It matters little that they do 



OTHER OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. 339 

not accept the supremacy of the pope. For all the 
purposes of the present argument they are out of place 
among Protestants. 

There is however a considerable portion of the 
membership, and even of the clergy of the Anglican 
churches, who are truly Protestants in faith and feeling. 
They do not by any means accept those doctrines of 
the church and the priesthood which have been enumer- 
ated above. They wish to retain the organic structure 
of the Anglican church for the sake of its prescribed 
and orderly form of worship, its venerable liturgy and 
its conservative tendencies. Such persons — and among 
them are found many of the noblest spirits of this 
century — will feel great reluctance to accepting that 
view of the church which is advocated in these pages. 
They will certainly perceive the tendency of those doc- 
trines to dissolve the organic superstructure of Angli- 
canism. They will ask with an honest solicitude which 
is worthy of our respect, Can that superstructure be 
maintained, when the power of the keys shall have been 
thoroughly discarded and eliminated from men's minds ; 
when it is admitted that baptism and the Lord's Supper 
require no priestly intervention to administer them, that 
the laying on of the hands of the bishop conveys neither 
power nor authority so to administer these rites as to 
render them acceptable to God and edifying to the 
people, and that the only authority of any church officer 
of any grade is moral and spiritual ? 

To such an inquiry it is reasonable to reply, that in 
such an altered condition of men's opinions, every por- 
tion of that system will, in the progress of events, be 
subjected to the enlightened discretion of a Christian 
people. The whole faith and life of the church will 
feel the searching influence of the teachings, the exam- 
ple and the spirit of the divine Master. It cannot 



34-0 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

escape the application of " the refiner's fire and the 
fuller's soap." The dross will be removed, the pure 
gold only will remain. Are not these devout and en- 
lightened men willing to submit to such a process ? 
On reflection, will they not court such a process to be 
fearlessly applied to their whole system ? There are 
certain considerations which are certainly exceedingly 
worthy the attention of that portion of the Anglican 
churches referred to. 

Such men cannot be satisfied with the wide separa- 
tion which exists between themselves and other Protes- 
tant churches. The candor, the fraternal spirit, the 
genuine catholicity of heart of such men as Whately 
and Alford and G. A. Jacob and the Tyngs give us the 
assurance, that these men cannot wish to disown the 
ministerial labors and discredit the ministerial standing 
of all ministers of Christ in other ecclesiastical connec- 
tions, to debar them from their pulpits, and to withhold 
from them all acts of ministerial courtesy. It is well 
worth the while of such men to inquire, how it is that they 
have been thrown into this condition of unnatural and 
unchristian isolation from their brethren. If they 
prosecute this inquiry with any degree of diligence, 
they will certainly not be long in discovering, that the 
source of that isolation is .jound only in those assump- 
tions of clerical power, which we have shown to have 
no foundation in the authority of the Head of the 
church. Dean Alford certainly knew well, that the 
Archbishop of Canterbury is, in the light of the New 
Testament, no more truly a minister of the church of 
Christ, and could no more confer ghostly powers by the 
laying on of his hands, than Mr. Spurgeon. This wide 
gulf was created and is perpetuated only by the assump- 
tion that a priesthood in three orders is essential to the 
constitution of the Christian church and the Christian 



OTHER OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. 341 

ministry, and that the external rites of Christianity can 
only be acceptably observed under the ministration of a 
clergy that has received the gift of ministering in them 
by the laying on of the bishop's hands. If this doc- 
trine is given in Scripture as an article of our Christian 
faith, then the good men of whom we are speaking are 
right in adhering to it in practice under whatever diffi- 
culties ; and the fault of this grievous separation lies 
only with those who stand aloof from the church as 
prelatically constituted. But if the authority of Jesus 
Christ and his apostles cannot be pleaded in support 
of this doctrine, then the fault of this grievous schism 
in the church of God must rest with those who adhere 
to it in practice. 

Such men ought also to consider, that these high 
priestly assumptions have borne bitter fruits in the past 
history of Christendom. Assume a priestly hierarchy 
as a fundamental principle of the church of Christ, and 
you have created a logical tendency toward ritualism 
in worship and spiritual despotism in government, which 
has always in the history of the past proved almost 
irresistible. This experiment has been so long and so 
often tried, that we ought to be thoroughly convinced 
that what always has been always will be. It was this 
logical tendency which converted the church of the 
ante-Nicene age into the church of the Middle Ages. 
It is the same logical tendency which is constantly 
manifesting itself in all the Anglican churches, and 
with which the enlightened men in those churches who 
hold a true spiritual faith, are engaged in perpetual 
conflict. If the organic principles of that church remain 
unquestioned and unchanged, that conflict will be as 
lasting as the church of God. It will pass on as it has 
done from the fathers to the children, and the children's 
children, through uncounted generations. It is a hope- 



342 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

less conflict with the organic principles of the system 
itself. Men may accept those organic principles as 
Archbishop Whately and Dr. G. A. Jacob have clone, 
only as a matter of expediency and for the sake of what 
seems to them order ; but they will no less produce 
their own proper logical results. The assumptions on 
which we build the church of Christ will always be. 
accepted by the great mass of its members as sacred 
and divine. What was regarded by the father and 
perhaps founder as merely expedient and orderly, will 
be regarded by his children and his children's children 
as holy and of divine appointment. 

It must not therefore be expected that the mighty 
chasm which separates prelatical from unprelatical 
Protestantism can ever be filled up or bridged over, 
by persuading the adherents of the latter to accept the 
theory of Anglicanism, as a mere matter of convenience 
and order. If we consent to build the church as though 
these priestly assumptions were true and of God, we 
shall doom ourselves and our children after us to eat 
the bitter and poisonous fruits which those assumptions 
have borne for fifteen centuries, and are bearing still 
before our eyes. There is but one way in which anti- 
prelatical Protestants can ever be induced to accept 
prelacy in any of its forms, and that is by convincing 
us that Jesus Christ and his apostles instituted and 
left in the church a prelatical priesthood. The Chris- 
tian men who occupy positions on opposite sides of 
this line must desire and pray that this great schism 
may be healed. It is a scandal in the eyes of the 
world, it must be offensive to God. It should be under- 
stood by them all that it can be healed either by demon- 
strating to the satisfaction of all good men, that Jesus 
Christ instituted a prelatical priesthood, or else by uni- 
versal consent to abandon what seems to me the chimera 



OTHER OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. 343 

of organic catholicity, and to accept the spiritual catho- 
licity of him who said, " My kingdom is not of this 
world." Without the slightest hesitation, I hold and 
maintain, that every man on both sides of the line is 
sacredly bound to accept the issue thus sharply put. 
Those who admit that a perpetual priestly hierarchy 
instituted by Christ himself is only a chimera, have no 
right to adhere to Anglicanism, or any form of prelacy 
as a matter of convenience and order. If a prelatical 
priesthood is not a divine institution, it is neither con- 
venient nor orderly, but an arrogant assumption, which 
will create a deplorable schism in the church of God, 
just so long as any good men are found to adhere to it. 
I yield to no man in fervent love of the catholicity of 
the church of Christ. For the sake of promoting it I 
will yield anything but my convictions of truth and 
righteousness. These no man has any right to yield ; 
and the catholicity of the church of Christ never can 
be realized, except by the universal consent of all good 
men to build only on the everlasting foundation of the 
truth as it is in Jesus. 

The adherents of the Anglican churches regard with 
reverence and affection the venerable, stately and 
somewhat aesthetic forms of worship which Anglicanism 
maintains. Perhaps it is not improper to suggest in 
this place, that the feelings with which those forms are 
regarded may be excessive and even morbid. It cer- 
tainly is not accordant with the spirit of Christianity to 
attach importance to the language or to any of the 
external forms and modes in which worship is expressed, 
or to any of the circumstances which attend it. It is 
freely admitted that the worship of the spirit is always 
acceptable to God under whatever forms presented. 
Doubtless he that worships God in spirit and in truth 
will be accepted of him, though he presents the offering 



344 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

of his heart amid the pomp and stately splendor of the 
cathedral, as truly as he who worships amid the hum- 
blest and most unpoetic surroundings. And yet the 
truth is undeniable, that a system which tends to lay 
the emphasis of worship on the taste, the beauty, the 
aesthetic perfection of the form and the circumstances 
is not a good system ; and the fact that those who adopt 
any system of worship are apt to attach a great deal of 
importance to these external circumstances should 
awaken our suspicion that all is not right. It suggests 
the fear, that the system tends to superstition rather 
than to spiritual worship. The sacred vestments of 
the clergy may produce a very agreeable impression on 
the taste and the imagination of those who are accus- 
tomed to them ; and yet it may be doubtful whether a 
constitution of public worship, which constantly culti- 
vates a reverence for the priestly garments which the 
ministers of religion wear, is harmonious in spirit with 
the religion of the New Testament. The reaction of 
the fathers of Puritanism against priestly forms, and 
especially against clerical vestments, may have been 
excessive, but it surely was not wholly without reason. 
There was just ground for apprehension, that in long 
ages, certainly much more characterized by attachment 
to the form than to the spirit of worship, a reverence 
had grown up for established forms and rites and 
priestly garments, which overshadowed and concealed 
from view that worship of the spirit, which it is the 
object of the Christian religion to cultivate. That 
reverence for the external forms of religion, which 
confessedly prevails in the Anglican churches, may be 
an argument for and not an objection against such a 
reconstruction as I advocate. Would it not be wiser 
and safer to withdraw the hand of ecclesiastical au- 
thority altogether from matters of this sort, and leave 



OTHER OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. 345 

them to the sound discretion of Christian people under 
the guiding influence of the word and spirit of God ? 

Certainly Jesus Christ did not prescribe the external 
forms in which worship should be paid, and the form 
and color and texture of the garments which should be 
worn by those who lead the devotions of his people. 
Can it then be expedient for us to attempt to regulate 
by law, or by immemorial custom having all the force 
of law, the innumerable details of our social religious 
life, which the Head and Founder of the church chose 
to leave to the good sense and free choice of his fol- 
lowers in all places and all times ? Can we entertain 
any reasonable hope that the church of Christ will ever 
have its true development, and obtain its true place in 
the world, till all men and all religious associations, and 
especially all officials of the church, shall cease from 
such officious intermeddling ? 

Another class of objections will come from those who 
are sincerely and devoutly attached to the polity and 
worship of Presbyterianism. They believe that the 
Christian religion can only exert its proper influence on 
the world, through the doctrines of Christ perpetually 
conserved in the church, and inculcated by it. No class 
of Christian men have ever held this belief with more 
commendable tenacity and earnestness, and for their 
fidelity in this regard they deserve the thanks of all 
true disciples of Christ. They are also well aware of 
those tendencies to swerve from the doctrine of Christ, 
and to substitute for it the commandments of men, 
which have been constantly active in every age of 
Christian history. They are strongly attached to the 
Presbyterian polity because they believe it to be emi- 
nently fitted to resist these encroachments of error, and 
to conserve evangelic truth. Many of them even regard 
the safeguards with which Presbyterianism surrounds 



346 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

and protects evangelic faith as quite essential to its 
perpetuity in the world, and are very seriously appre- 
hensive, that if these ecclesiastical barriers were broken 
down, all the landmarks of "orthodoxy" would be 
swept away, and that truth and falsehood would be 
mingled together in undistinguishable confusion. Such 
men will regard the doctrines of this book with distrust 
and apprehension, lest if generally received they would 
tend to disintegrate this ecclesiastical system, and re- 
move the barriers which separate Presbyterians from 
the rest Of the Christian world. 

They may be right in this apprehension, as they cer- 
tainly are in their estimate of the importance of con- 
serving Christian truth. It may be necessary to view 
that system a little in detail, for the purpose of inquir- 
ing whether the power of the keys is indispensable to 
its compactness and permanency. One might easily 
become convinced by a little reflection, that one leading 
function of a Presbyterian church session is the official 
guardianship of the Lord's Supper ; and that, as all 
the acts of the session are subject to the revision of 
the higher judicatories, this function pervades the entire 
system. It is freely admitted that an eldership (pres- 
bytery) existed in some of the churches of apostolic 
times, and probably in all, but with very different func- 
tions from those of the present Presbyterian eldership, 
or at least without the special function above described. 
It was not a judicial body, an ecclesiastical court, but 
a body of men chosen on account of their experience, 
wisdom and purity of life, and intrusted with the spir- 
itual oversight of the whole brotherhood. Such an 
eldership might be maintained with great advantage in 
every church, though entirely divested of the power of 
the keys. But such a church session could not be an 
integral portion of the Presbyterian ecclesiastical sys- 



OTHER OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. 347 

tem as at present constituted. Its acts could not form 
a basis of appeal . to the higher church courts. They 
could have no jurisdiction over it. Jurisdiction and 
the right of appeal imply judicial decision, trial, convic- 
tion and a sentence. The acts of such an eldership 
would be purely moral, and could no more be a ground 
of appeal to a highter court than a father's loving 
admonition to his children could be brought under the 
jurisdiction of a civil court. 

Presbyterianism is essentially an association of clergy- 
men for the government of the church. There is indeed 
a large and very influential and useful popular element 
in it. In the United States at least, no man can 
become a pastor without the election of a particular 
congregation, and no man can become an elder without 
the appointment of the church in which he is to exer- 
cise the office. But no man can have any share in the 
government of the Presbyterian Church, who has not 
first been made a clergyman by ordination. It is true 
that the Presbyterian Church earnestly rejects all priest- 
hood, but the priesthood of our Lord Jesus Christ. 
Yet in one respect its clergy exercise a priestly func- 
tion. No one can draw near to God in the observance 
of the rites of baptism and the Lord's Supper without 
the intervention of the clergy. The very idea of a clergy 
implies mediation, and mediation is essentially priestly. 
If then you remove from the whole church of Christ the 
clerical idea and function, or in other words, if you bring 
back the church to the original conception of apostolic 
times, you destroy the only materials out of which such 
an ecclesiastical edifice as the Presbyterian Church in the 
United States or the Free Church of Scotland can be 
built. I cannot disguise this view of the doctrine I am 
advocating from my own mind, nor do I wish to dis- 
guise it from, the mind of the reader. . Church organiza- 



348 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

tion nas been changed from what it was in apostolic 
hands to what it is in the nineteenth century by the 
logical influence of an assumption which was unknown 
to the primitive church ; and if we renounce that 
assumption and eliminate it from all our church organi- 
zations, we shall bring back the church itself to its 
primitive constitution. Without the renunciation of 
that assumption, the recovery of the original constitu- 
tion of the church is logically impossible. 

A clear perception of this logical result will create in 
many minds grave apprehensions, lest the church prin- 
ciples which I advocate would remove valuable barriers, 
by which Christian truth is hedged around and power- 
fully guarded against the incursions of error. It be- 
comes necessary therefore to inquire what these barriers 
are, and whether they are really valuable for the defence 
of the truth as it is in Jesus. In conducting this inquiry, 
I shall not for one moment forget that I am handling 
a subject of grave importance. No man can over-esti- 
mate its importance. They who forsake evangelic 
truth forsake Christ, and lose their hold of the only 
instrument by which he purposed to save a lost world. 
Nor shall I forget, that I am dealing with earnest, hon- 
est men, whose attachment to Christian truth is devout 
and sincere, and who adhere to the system which they 
love, because it is their abiding conviction, that it is 
eminently valuable in guarding the church against the 
incursions of error. 

The protection which Presbyterianism seems to fur- 
nish against the inroads of false doctrine is twofold. 
The churches are bound by the constitution to call no 
one to the pastorate whose soundness in the faith has 
not been already vouched for by the presbytery, and to 
induct no one into the pastoral office except by the 
act of tire presbytery. Again the presbytery and all 



OTHER OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. 349 

the higher judicatories of the church are constitutionally- 
bound to lay hands in ordination on no one, except on 
condition of his solemnly declaring his acceptance and 
adoption of the recognized standards of the church. 
Is then the first of these provisions helpful to the pres- 
ervation of doctrinal soundness ? If so it is strange 
indeed that we find no trace of such an institution in 
the primitive church. It may perhaps be said, that 
during their lifetime the apostles regulated this matter 
by their own personal influence. Considering the vast 
area over f/hich Christianity had spread itself in the 
lifetime of the apostles, it must have been but a feeble 
supervision which twelve men could have exercised 
over all the churches. The apostles moreover knew 
well that, like other men, they must soon pass away, 
and they have left behind the proof that they were 
quite aware that perilous times were near at hand. If 
then it had been possible to create an effectual or use- 
ful barrier against the incursions of error, by placing 
the government of all the churches in the hands of such 
a clerical association as is created by the constitution 
of the Presbyterian Church, why did not the apostles 
guard against the imminent perils of the near future, 
by placing the selection of church officers under such 
a clerical supervision ? 

This question shuts us up to a single alternative. 
We must either renounce our confidence in the expedi- 
ency and wisdom of such arrangements, or we must 
deny that the apostles were divinely endowed with 
wisdom to found and constitute the church, and assume 
that they were no more inspired in respect to the organ- 
ization of the church than other men. According to 
this view of the case, the constitution of the church is, 
like all human institutions, a proper subject for experi- 
ment, and likely to be successively improved age after 



35° 



THE KEYS OF SECT. 



age as. the result of experience. Very few devout 
believers in the supernatural origin of the Christian 
religion and church are fully prepared to subscribe to 
this doctrine. And yet the whole sect system of our 
times really assumes it, and builds upon it as its funda- 
mental principle. It is only another form of the prin- 
ciple already examined, that no system of church polity 
is found in the New Testament. If this is so, we are 
wasting our time in seeking a remedy for the evils and 
confusions of sect. On this supposition, the Founder 
of Christianity himself is responsible for these evils and 
confusions. 

And- yet in another view of the .case, we are not hope- 
less of a remedy, even on the assumption that the 
apostles were not divinely endowed with wisdom to 
constitute the church. Jesus Christ is still the one 
only Founder of Christianity and the church, and 
neither the apostles nor any Christian people in any 
age can have a right so to found the church, as to con- 
travene the clearly expressed fundamental principles of 
his kingdom. It has been abundantly shown that the 
power of the keys does contravene those principles, 
and consequently no company of believers, great or 
small, can have a right to construct a church on that 
basis. It has already been proved that, without the 
power of the keys, such a clerical guardianship of 
doctrinal soundness as is provided by the Presbyterian 
Church cannot be maintained. You cannot have a 
government without a penalty. If you deny to the 
church the right to debar its members from the privi- 
lege of participating in the Lord's Supper, you deprive 
it of all power of inflicting a penalty. You render judi- 
cial trial, conviction, condemnation, appeal, impossible. 
You take away the whole foundation upon which a 
system of church courts can rest, and destroy the possi- 



OTHER OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. 35 1 

bility of erecting and maintaining any of those great 
compact ecclesiastical systems which divide modern 
Christendom. You bring back the church to the primi- 
tive model. One may say then that the clerical super- 
vision of the faith of the church provided by Presbyte- 
rianism is very wise and useful, and would have been 
adopted by the apostles if they had only been wise 
enough to invent it ; but they can have no right, for the 
sake of maintaining and perpetuating that supervision, 
to assume a control and guardianship of a rite which 
the Head of the church gave to be freely enjoyed by 
the whole multitude of the disciples, wherever two or 
three are gathered together in his name. It is no vin- 
dication of su:h a usurpation to say, that it is necessary 
to the maintenance of an arrangement of our own inven- 
tion, whicn we may happen to think wise and useful. 
In any case the church can have no authority which 
was not conferred on it by its Founder. 

But after all, is it self-evident, or has it been proved, 
that the ecclesiastical arrangements of Presbyterianism 
are truly conservative of Christian doctrine ? Does the 
history of the church show that clerical control is more 
conservative of doctrinal soundness than the freedom 
of the local church to select its own officers and relig- 
ious teachers without any such clerical supervision ? It 
has been shown in the progress of this work, that the 
early church after the death of the apostles did very 
rapidly depart from primitive simplicity and purity of 
faith and worship. It is remarkable, and as obvious as 
remarkable, that among the earliest symptoms of this 
departure, we everywhere find the increase of official 
supervision, the origin and growth of clerical power, and 
the diminished influence of the brotherhood in the ar- 
rangements of the church. Clerical usurpation was 
both the sign and the cause of the progress of corrup- 



35 2 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

tion. The same thing has been true in subsequent 
ages. False doctrine has found its way into the 
churches far more through the clergy than through the 
brotherhood. The church never has been and never 
can be safe, except in so far as the clergy are respon- 
sible to a devout brothereood, having free access to the 
divine word, and the free choice of their own religious 
teachers. Any deviation from such a constitution of 
the church has always been dangerous to its soundness 
in the faith. From the Reformation to the present 
time, those churches that have been freest in their 
constitution and most directly subject to the control 
of the brotherhood, have held most tenaciously to 
the evangelic faith. Want of space forbids an exam- 
ination of this subject in detail. Let the religious his- 
tory of Germany, of Geneva, of England, Scotland, and 
the United States, of France, and the Low Countries, be 
examined in reference to this subject, and the result will 
be found to be the same. 

Perhaps it will still be said that a constitution of the 
church which renders it impossible for any one to obtain 
ordination either as a minister or an elder, without a 
solemn declaration of adhesion to such orthodox stand- 
ards as those of the Presbyterian Church, must be 
conservative of doctrinal soundness. This assertion 
cannot be accepted without proof. No one is prepared 
to deny the doctrinal soundness of the Thirty-nine 
Articles of the Anglican Church. Has the necessity of 
subscribing to those Articles insured the doctrinal 
soundness of her clergy ? Is there one error in doc- 
trine, lying anywhere between the extremes of the worst 
superstitions of the papal church on the one hand, and 
the baldest rationalism on the other, which does not find 
believers and advocates among the clergy of the Church 
of England? It is impossible so to constitute the 



OTHER. OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. 353 

church that the position of a religious teacher will not 
present attractions to worldly ambition. The eloquent 
pulpit orator will draw from his admiring hearers tempt- 
ing pecuniary rewards, and win a position of influence 
and fame. Such attractions will be irresistible to the 
unscrupulous and unprincipled, and for the sake of 
obtaining such prizes, they will subscribe to any state- 
ment of doctrine you can propose to them. The neces- 
sity of subscription will prove a snare to good men. A 
certain latitude of interpretation must be allowed. In the 
attempt to reduce Christianity to a precise and definite 
form of statement in all its details, not only of doctrine 
but of doctrinal speculation and systemization, no one 
man's language can exactly express the thought of an- 
other. No form of statement can exactly coincide with 
the individual opinions of all the men composing such a 
body as the Westminster Assembly. It will express 
nobody's belief exactly. The necessity of granting 
some latitude becomes an irresistible plea for more, un- 
til in the course of time it is considered perfectly right 
and proper for men holding widely different religious 
systems, to subscribe to the same standards. The plea 
is, that men subscribe only for " substance of doc- 
trine "; but how much of the substance each one em- 
braces in his subscription, we have no means of deter- 
mining. 

It has long seemed to me, that such loose subscription 
to articles of faith is on the one hand inevitable, it we 
require any subscription at all, and on the other im- 
moral and demoralizing. I have never been able to 
believe, in view of the facts which have been before my 
eyes, that it is conservative either of soundness in the 
faith or purity of morals. It was only two or three 
years ago, that the attention of the whole American 
public was attracted by an ecclesiastical trial, in which 
2 3 



354 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

a man of very high reputation as a pulpit orator was 
very earnestly charged before his presbytery with heresy. 
He allowed himself to be arraigned, amd pleaded, " Not 
guilty," and was placed on trial before an ecclesiastical 
court. He was earnestly defended by men of very high 
reputation in the Presbyterian Church, of undoubted 
doctrinal soundness, and was acquitted by the judg- 
ment of the court. And yet the doctrinal teaching of 
the accused, as heard from Sabbath to Sabbath by large 
and admiring audiences, and as it appeared in numer- 
ous published discourses, was about as far removed as 
can well be imagined from the " system of doctrine " 
taught in the standards of the Presbyterian Church. I 
heard him myself. I was shocked, my soul was sick at 
the terrible contrast between the doctrines which he had 
solemnly professed to believe, and those which he pub- 
licly preached. To call the career of Prof. David 
Swing as a Presbyterian minister a ridiculous farce, is 
to speak far too lightly of it. I could not help regard- 
ing it as a sort of mockery. Yet I affirm that just such 
results must always be expected sooner or later to come 
from the attempt to conserve doctrinal soundness, by 
such a system of clerical supervision as that of Presby- 
terianism. 

The difficulties which are encountered in requiring 
subscription to articles of faith as a condition of hold- 
ing responsible public positions are not anything new, 
but have long been known and acknowledged by 
thoughtful men. There is positive historic evidence 
that some men 1 who were conspicuous in framing the 

1 On page 775, Bibliothecra Sacra, Vol. XXX., will be found an 
extract from a letter of Dr. Anthony Tuckney to Dr. Benjamin 
Whichcote, from which I copy the following language relating to 
Dr. Tuckney's action as a member of the Westminster Assembly : 
" For matter of imposing upon, I am not guilty. In the Assembly 



OTHER OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. 355 

Westminster Confession of Faith did not desire that 
subscription to it should be required.- It was regarded 
only as a declaration of the faith of the churches, and 
not as a test of the orthodoxy of each individual candi- 
date for the ministry. The formularies of doctrine of 
the Congregational churches have always been under- 
stood in the same way. Even the Confessions of Faith 
of particular churches were not, in the early history of 
Congregationalism in this country, used to test the doc- 
trinal soundness of individuals. Candidates for admis- 
sion to the church were expected to state their views 
of doctrine in their own language, and according to the 
age and experience and acquirements of each. The 
application of the same form of words as a measure of 
the faith of all candidates for admission to the church, 
old or young, learned or ignorant, is of comparatively 
recent origin, and goes along with a great many other 
facts to show that change is not always improvement. 

The difficulties connected with subscription are in- 
herent in the very nature of the case, and can never be 
removed. Every true Protestant admits, that the Scrip- 
tures are the only authoritative standard of faith, and 
that no formulary of doctrine can have any binding force 
at all, any further than it agrees with the Scriptures. 
No man, who is well enough informed on the subject 
to be entitled to have any opinion at all, will for a 
moment hesitate to admit, that while the Scriptures 
themselves are changeless, our knowledge of them is 

I gave my vote with others that the confession of faith, put out by 
authority, should not be required to be either sworn or subscribed 
to (we having been burned in the hand in that kind before), but so 
as not to be publicly preached or written against." This extract 
is taken from Prof. Park's very interesting analysis of Whichcote's 
Aphorisms, in the April and October numbers of the volume above 
referred to. 



356 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

progressive. He who does not know that the scholar- 
ship of the last two centuries has thrown a great deal 
of light upon the interpretation of the Scriptures, knows 
nothing at all about the matter. If then our formu- 
laries of doctrine are of authority only so far as they 
agree with the Scriptures, and our knowledge of the 
Scriptures is progressive, then the creeds of the seven- 
teenth century cannot reasonably be expected accurately 
to express the religious thought of the nineteenth ; and 
it must be preposterous to attempt to measure the 
orthodoxy of the nineteenth century by the doctrinal 
formularies of the seventeenth. No creed can accu- 
rately measure the faith of its own age. Much less can 
it truly represent the faith of subsequent ages of intense 
mental activity, and devout and earnest' scholarship. 
If the church will make such attempts, she will always 
involve herself in serious difficulties in consequence of 
them. 

If the church insists on employing a statement of 
Christian doctrine constructed in a former age, with 
however much wisdom and devoutness, as her perma- 
nent doctrinal standard in ages of profound and earnest 
scholarship, she will inevitably be involved in one of 
two difficulties. Either subscription will become loose, 
unscrupulous and latitudinarian, and the whole efficacy 
of her standards will be frittered away by unrestrained 
laxity of interpretation, and the standards themselves 
will become a dead letter ; or else devout, earnest, honest 
men will turn their backs upon her, and refuse to wear 
the yoke which she insists on imposing. Either she 
will allow her standards to pass into neglect, and sub- 
scription to become an unmeaning form, or she will 
herself be neglected by the brightest minds and the 
noblest men who are trained under the influence of 
Christianity. The same form of words cannot remain 



OTHER OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. 357 

appropriately expressive of ever-changeful and progres- 
sive thought. Living thought always grows, and grow- 
ing thought always requires living, growing language for 
its expression. 

It may be asked, Why then, since the Bible is a col- 
lection of language, will it not become obsolete also ? 
There is more than one reason why it will not. T\ie 
first is a sufficient one. The Bible is a revelation from 
God. Its truths do not originate in a limited human 
mind, but in a divine, all-knowing mind. It is reason- 
able therefore to expect, that improvement in knowl- 
edge of the great religious themes with which the Bible 
deals, instead of making its language seem inappropriate 
and inexpressive, will give us a clearer appreciation of its 
appropriateness and expressiveness. This is not theory 
but fact, attested by. the experience of millions. For ex- 
ample, the more we know of the profound truths which 
our Lord expressed in the beatitudes, the more shall we 
be convinced of the appropriateness and complete ade- 
quacy of his language to express them. The Scriptures 
are full of illustrations of the same truth. No man, no 
body of men can formulate a system of religious truth 
for all subsequent ages, without the same perfect knowl- 
edge of the subject which was possessed by him who 
has given a revelation of himself in the Scriptures. 

Another reason why the Scriptures cannot become 
obsolete is, that they instruct us, not in the language 
of abstraction and generalization, but in the concrete 
forms of common life, of the affections and the imagina- 
tion, which are far more available for the permanent 
expression of truth. Abstraction and generalization are 
limiting processes, and are only relative to an individual 
mind, or to a comparatively small number of minds, 
that view things under the same aspect. As soon as 
that aspect is in any degree changed, the language 



358 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

becomes inappropriate and unmeaning. Progress in 
knowledge is very likely sooner or later to render it 
obsolete. The language of Scripture has to do with 
facts which can never change, and can therefore be 
accurately and permanently delineated. In communi- 
cating to us a great religious truth, it is not confined to 
a single abstraction or generalization, but sets it before 
the mind with all that variety of imagery which the 
imagination can furnish ; and that imagery is drawn 
from the great, deep, permanent sources of human na- 
ture and human life. How barren are all those expres- 
sions of the divine attributes which are available to the 
creed-maker, as compared with the infinite variety with 
which those same attributes are represented under the 
innumerable concrete forms which the Scriptures em- 
ploy ! How hopeless the attempt to compress all the 
truth expressed in the latter into the narrow dimensions 
which are possible to the former ! How reasonable to 
expect that as men devoutly study the Scriptures, and 
advance in the knowledge of them from age to age, the 
expressions of religious truth which have been formu- 
lated in past ages will become inadequate to the needs 
of the present time ! 

Perhaps in reply to all this it may be said, that if the 
church fails to fence herself around by some such im- 
passable landmarks, there is no telling whither she will 
drift. Something must be fixed, settled. But, it is 
replied, if we receive the Scriptures as the word of God, 
containing a revelation of the truth which man needs to 
know to guide him in the way of salvation, something is 
fixed and settled, and no good reason can be given why 
we should not accept it, instead of erecting other land- 
marks of our own devising. Are we wiser than God? 
Can we erect landmarks of truth more wisely than the 
Author of divine revelation has done ? It may be said. 



OTHER OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. 359 

men differ widely in the interpretation of the Scriptures. 
Do they differ more widely than the leading minds in 
the Presbyterian Church did, in the trial of Dr. Lyman 
Beecher, or Albert Barnes, or Prof. David Swing? In 
these last-mentioned cases, all parties admitted that the 
standards of the church were not authoritative, except 
so far as they agree with Scripture ; but if we recognize 
the Scriptures as the word of God, their authority is 
final. There can be no course of wisdom and propriety 
open to those who receive the Scriptures as a revelation 
from God, except to leave the way always open for a 
direct appeal to their authority. Experience shows that 
we cannot trust an infallible church, governed by an in- 
fallible pope ; for it has led men for ages into the most 
degrading superstitions and the most terrific despotisms. 
We cannot trust to any formulary of doctrine which one 
age has made to be imposed upon another; for the 
makers of it knew not all things, and " more truth is 
perpetually breaking out of God's Holy Word, as 
precious as any which had before been made known." 
We can trust the word and spirit of God to guide the' 
church of God over unknown seas to that blessed haven 
of purity and wisdom and beneficent power for which God 
has destined her. He who is not willing to trust the 
church to such a guiding hand has less faith in God and 
Christ and the Bible and the Spirit than he ought to 
have. 

Another objection will come with great force to many 
minds certainly in this country, from quite another quar- 
ter. The Methodist Episcopal Church in the United 
States has a very peculiar origin and history. It origi- 
nated from the almost apostolic labors of the Wesleys 
and Whitefield. It was a genuine revival of evangelic 
faith and labors, in the midst of the dead formality into 
which religion had sunk in England. As an organism 



360 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

it has never laid any claims to a Scriptural origin. As 
an Episcopal organization it stands upon the same basis 
of argument as any other form of Episcopacy, that is, 
it can lay no claim whatever to apostolic authority. So 
far as I am acquainted with its literature, it has never 
set up any claim to such authority, but has relied alto- 
gether upon considerations of expediency and utility. 
In this respect it is very widely distinguished from the 
Anglican and papal churches. The organization as a 
whole is an invention of Mr. John Wesley, and was 
constructed for a single and definite purpose, — to com- 
municate the impulse of that revival of religious faith 
and fervor, which begun with him and his associates, as 
widely as possible. The instrument by which this was 
to be accomplished was a band af preachers of the gos- 
pel with an almost military organization, of which Mr. 
Wesley himself was, during his lifetime, the head. The 
system had in it almost the compactness of the order of 
Jesuits. Each preacher was subject to the will of his 
superior, to the full extent of holding himself in readi- 
ness to go anywhere and do any work which was 
assigned him. The whole system was thus controlled 
by a single will. He had thus during his lifetime, and 
after his death, the bishops who succeeded him at the 
head of the system, the absolute control of a constantly 
increasing army of earnest preachers, to communicate 
the impulse to every part of England, and over the seas 
wherever the English language was spoken. Recruits 
were made for this spiritual army, not chiefly from the 
learned and cultivated classes, but largely from the 
unlearned, and reliance was placed for their success on 
their zeal and earnestness, and on such efforts at self- 
improvement as they might make while prosecuting their 
work. The lasting aim of the whole organization is to 
give efficiency and ubiquity to this spiritual army. 



OTHER OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. 361 

That it has been efficient is abundantly attested by 
the vast numbers who have been gathered into the 
Methodist connection, wherever the English language 
is spoken. Such importance do vast multitudes of 
men attach to that peculiar organization by which these 
results have been achieved, that they feel an insuper- 
able objection to any church principles, which tend to 
weaken or essentially modify it. The system is, in their 
minds, consecrated and made sacred, not only by the 
venerable name of Mr. Wesley, but by the great results 
it has achieved. Such men will look upon the doctrines 
I am advocating with great suspicion and distrust. 
They will entertain a grave apprehension, that in so far 
as these doctrines gain prevalence, they will destroy 
the cement which binds together the great Methodist 
system, and merge its membership without discrimina- 
tion in the great mass of the disciples of Christ, so that 
its organic machinery will no longer be available as an 
instrument of propagandism. It cannot be denied that 
such apprehensions are not without foundation. The 
itinerant ministry of the Methodist Episcopal Church 
holds the power of the keys. The whole discipline of 
the church is subject to its control. It holds the guar- 
dianship of baptism and the Lord's Supper in its hands, 
and freely exercises it over all the vast membership of 
the church. It is here as everywhere else in the history 
of Christendom a mighty instrument of power. It is in 
this, as in all the other great ecclesiastical systems, the 
foundation upon which the whole superstructure is 
reared. That this superstructure can, more than any 
other, be maintained without it, I do not believe. I do 
not ask the men who so keenly feel the force of this 
objection to believe it. 

No well-informed man will doubt, that the peculiar 
ecclesiastical machinery of Methodism has achieved 



362 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

great and important results in its brief history. But it 
is too much to assume, either that it was the only or 
even the best system that could have been devised for 
the purpose, or that it will prove suited to all the exi- 
gencies of the church of God in all the future. It is 
possible that our friends of the Methodist connection 
do not always appreciate their true relation to the relig- 
ious progress of the times. It is just possible, that in 
the exhilaration of success, they sometimes fail duly to 
estimate the importance of other forces which are at 
work in the world besides those which they are wield- 
ing. It certainly is true, that the results in which they 
themselves rejoice could not have been achieved with- 
out the presence and activity of other religious bodies 
in the midst of which they have acted. Without them 
their system would have been but the otae half of a pair 
of shears. The necessity of the Methodist system has 
resulted from the defects of other religious bodies ; and 
those defects are caused by that faulty constitution of 
the church, which I am endeavoring to point out. 
Their faulty and imperfect constitution left a want in 
the world which for the time being Methodism has 
admirably supplied. But that want will not exist for- 
ever. It. will pass away, and with it the necessity for 
the peculiar function of the Methodist Episcopal Church. 
That system is already showing, that it is not adapted 
to meet all the exigencies of the present and the future. 
By nothing is it more strikingly characterized of late 
than by the rapid changes it is undergoing. He whose 
memory goes back far enough to enable him to compare 
the Methodism of fifty years ago with that of the present, 
can hardly recognize its identity. These changes are 
all in the direction of rendering the Methodists less a 
peculiar people, and more like the membership of other 
Christian bodies, That it is rapidly becoming one of 



OTHER OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. $6$ 

the greatest, perhaps the greatest of the Protestant 
sects is cheerfully admitted ; but with this growth it is 
becoming in other respects more and more like the rest 
of us. This indicates clearly enough, that Methodists 
themselves are conscious, that the peculiarities of their 
system are no longer adapted as formerly to the work 
to be done, and that great changes have become neces- 
sary, to adapt it to the altered circumstances in which 
it is to act. It has been claimed that Methodism is 
peculiarly fitted for frontier work, and that therefore it 
will continue to be of great value, as long as there is 
any frontier work to be done. This assertion is partly 
true, but it is much too sweeping. Nowhere was fron- 
tier work ever more thoroughly and effectually done 
than in New England ; and it was inorganic Congrega- 
tionalism that did it. Presbyterianism did grand frontier 
work in Western Pennsylvania. Never did Methodism 
work more efficiently on the frontier than did Presby- 
terianism and Congregationalism in Northern Ohio. 
Congregationalism, a mere "rope of sand" as it is, is' 
stretching out its hands to-day along a vast frontier in 
Minnesota and Dakota, with a vigor never surpassed 
by any organization however compact and military. 
But why dwell on these examples ? It was no compact 
and army-like organization, that carried the gospel in 
the primitive age to the Euphrates on the East, and the 
pillars of Hercules on the West. It was fervent faith 
and the oneness of that spiritual catholicity, which the 
Founder of the church instituted. Whenever the Lord's 
people will return again to a like faith and a like cath- 
olicity, they will need no compact organization to do 
frontier work, and to achieve miracles in the propaga- 
tion of the gospel. Every wilderness shall be glad for 
them ; every desert shall rejoice and bud and blossom 
as the rose. 



364 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

There are stubborn facts which indicate beyond con- 
tradiction, that the Methodist system is not suited to 
the exigencies of the times, nay, that it stands as an 
impassable barrier to the steps of progress which it is 
indispensable that the people of God should take. I 
have no unkindly feelings towards any of my brethren, 
no antipathies to which I am impelled to give utterance, 
no wrongs either of myself or my party to revenge. But 
it is impossible to accomplish the task which I have 
undertaken, without the utmost freedom of utterance. 
Such freedom I must claim and use. Nowhere in the 
world has the sectarian condition of modern Christianity 
so completely produced and ripened its appropriate 
fruits as in some of the great States of the Upper Mis- 
sissippi Valley. The state of things existing there has 
been already alluded to • but it is necessary to allude 
to it again as an illustration of the matter now under 
consideration. Over great districts of some of those 
States, sectarian divisions have become so minute that 
it is impossible to sustain any effective and satisfactory 
arrangements for public worship, outside the cities and 
large towns. It is clearly and demonstrably impossible 
to accomplish anything for the improvement of our 
religious civilization, except by the union of Christian 
people now embraced in different sects in a common 
effort for the religious welfare of themselves and their 
children and their neighbors. In the progress of the 
work, we have come upon an obstacle which the Meth- 
odist phalanx, though as compact as the Macedonian, 
cannot break through. It is not adapted to the work 
to be done. The more compact the worse. It is not 
compactness but solubility that is wanted, in order that 
the elements now all too strongly combined together 
in inert sectarian masses, may be set at liberty from 
their bondage, and combine themselves in that one 



OTHER OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. 365 

vital product of faith and love, a church of Jesus 
Christ. 

Many excellent men believe that the arrangements 
of the Methodist Church go far to relieve that religious 
destitution which I complain of as existing in the rural 
districts. I cannot agree with them. They may have 
provided places of public worship at such distances 
from each other, that if the people were all earnestly 
desirous of assembling for the worship of God, most 
families might reach them. But at those houses of 
worship, they make no adequate provision for the re- 
ligious instruction and edification of the community. 
Perhaps the circuit preacher delivers two discourses a 
month at each of these places of worship. Probably 
at many of them he has not more than one appointment 
in a month. The intermediate Sabbaths may be sup- 
plied, or they may not, by the local preachers of the 
vicinity. But they are men who obtain their livelihood 
by the various secular occupations, and have little 
special fitness for ministering to the spiritual edifica- 
tion of the people. The community is not reached. 
In this respect the Methodist Church has no special 
pre-eminence over other Protestant religious bodies. 
It reaches its own members, and is in a great measure 
foreign to the rest of the people. Meanwhile it pre- 
sents a powerful obstacle to any united effort of all who 
love Christ for the religious welfare of the community. 
It holds its own members with great tenacity. The 
circuit preacher derives his support from several places 
of worship, each of which he visits once or twice a 
month, and cannot afford to relinquish his hold on the 
small pittance which he receives from any one of them. 
The aim of the army-like organization is the ubiquity 
of the Methodist preacher, and that object will be pur- 
sued with the same unfaltering energy, whatever the 



366 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

nature of the obstacles encountered. When the thing 
to be done is to carry the gospel of Christ into regions 
beyond, where there are none to speak for him, it is 
very well ; but these are not the conditions under which 
the Methodist system is pushed in the regions to which 
I refer. In innumerable instances, it is only an effort 
to hold fast a handful of adherents of Methodism, and 
prevent their being merged in the mass of religious 
people around them, in a united organization for the 
spiritual welfare of the whole community. The system 
contends with the same tireless energy to maintain the 
separateness of Methodists from all other Christian 
people, as to proclaim the gospel where Christ is not 
named. In this respect Methodism pursues its work 
precisely as it would do if its adherents believed it to 
be the one only true church, out of which there is no 
salvation. Let me not be misunderstood. I do not 
mean that Methodists hold any such exclusive doctrine, 
but that they adhere to their system and carry it out 
just as though they did. 

It may be true that the same charge may to a con- 
siderable extent be made against other religious bodies, 
but it seems to me thoughtful Methodists would, on 
reflection, admit that it is somewhat pre-eminently true 
of them. I am not without my hopes that they will 
also agree with other Christian people in admitting, 
that it is wrong; that it is an application of the 
machinery for propagandism founded by Wesley, which 
that truly apostolic man never intended. The time has 
certainly come over vast regions of our country, when 
the kingdom of Christ is no longer to be promoted by 
pushing any one of our great Protestant organizations 
with unscrupulous zeal in advance of all others, but by 
uniting all Christians in whatever bonds of sect they 
may have been bound up, in the common faith of Jesus 



OTHER OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. 367 

Christ our Lord, and in co-operative effort for the sal- 
vation of themselves and their families and the commu- 
nities in which they dwell. Any sect, no matter how 
sound in faith, no matter what victories it may have 
achieved in the past, or how exultant in its successes, 
which holds a portion of a community separate from 
their Christian neighbors, and hinders their co-operation 
with all that love Christ, in efforts to provide for the 
permanent spiritual culture of the community, where 
only by such unity that culture can be provided for, 
stands opposed to the true interests of religion, and the 
progress of Christ's kingdom among us. It is high 
time that every man in whatever religious connection 
should lay this matter seriously to heart. A sect that 
employs the religious machinery which the sainted 
Wesley devised, for the promotion of its own ubiquity 
and power, rather than for the kingdom of God, is just 
so far acting on principles which cannot be justified, 
when judged by the Christian standard. Few of our 
sects it is to be feared can honestly judge themselves by 
this standard without self-condemnation. 

The objection to the church principles advocated in 
this book, which will be chiefly insisted on by those 
who are attached to the Congregational polity, was 
considered in the chapter on church discipline. 



368 THE KEYS OF SECT. 



CHAPTER VII. 

CONGREGATIONALISM. 

It has bee.n my aim to pursue this discussion with 
the strictest impartiality. I was born indeed and cradled 
in Congregationalism. Under it I received the nurture 
of my childhood and youth. But I had not acquired 
the slightest partiality for it, when I received ordination 
from Congregational hands. The churches with which 
I had been connected h?A represented to my mind, not 
a peculiar mode of ecclesiastical organization, but the 
church of God, and to that I was devoutly attached. 
It was only amid ths stern and often very trying expe- 
riences of the Christian ministry and of missionary life 
on the frontiers of civilization, that I first learned to 
love and cherish those church principles under which 
I had grown up, without however having been educated 
in them, or understood them in their relations to other 
systems of church polity. Under those circumstances 
I acquired, in the early part of my ministry, a very 
decided attachment to the general principles, and espe- 
cially to the aim and spirit of that polity, and with it 
my life has been rather intimately associated. I am 
therefore strongly impelled by what amounts to almost 
a feeling of necessity, to point out the bearing of the 
doctrines I advocate on that polity, as held by its 
founders in the seventeenth century, and by the churches 
of this country. 



CONGREGATIONALISM. 369 

At this stage of the inquiry, the reader need not be 
toid that I hold, that the church universal, the kingdom 
of heaven, can have no earthly or official organization, 
and that ■ the only organized church which Christianity 
admits is the local society of believers. This also is 
rigidly bound by all the laws and general principles of 
the universal kingdom. In this respect the Congrega- 
tionalism of the pilgrim fathers is in close agreement 
with the principles and practices of apostolic times. 
The whole Christian world is laid under great obliga- 
tion to the churches of that form, for having proved by 
the experience of three hundred years, that it is possible 
for modern Christendom to return to the simple mode 
of organization practised by the apostles, and to enjoy 
under it a high degree of prosperity, purity and spiritual 
power. This they have proved beyond any reasonable 
attempt at gainsaying. The independence of the local 
church of all control except that of the Master himself 
is not a mere theory of visionary minds, but has been 
as thoroughly and as successfully tested by experience 
as any of the organizations of Protestantism. It very 
strongly commends itself to the favorable consideration 
of the whole Christian world by some of the results 
which it has produced. 

One of these results which is worthy of honorable 
mention is the spirit of genuine catholicity which has 
grown up under its influence. It is the only one of the 
Protestant sects, which has ever manifested a willing- 
ness, in the very fulness of power and opportunity, to 
impart its strength to another organization, for the sake 
of promoting the unity and prosperity of the church of 
Christ. While Congregationalists were by far the 
strongest and most numerous body in this country, and 
enjoyed unequalled advantages for spreading themselves 
abroad over the continent, they did freely contribute 
24 



370 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

their pecuniary resources, and a body of emigrants the 
most enlightened and influential that any people ever 
sent out, to strengthen and build up other religious 
bodies, and that only because they dreaded and abhorred 
sectarian divisions, and wished to promote the unity of 
the church, along those frontiers where their emigrants 
in great numbers were mingling with Christian people 
of other polities. This they continued to do for fifty 
years, because they believed the gospel and united 
effort in promoting it to be more important than any 
mere polity however excellent. This they would have 
continued to do till the present time, if passing events 
had not taught them by painful experience, that that 
catholic spirit which was leading them to sacrifice their 
own simple polity could not be conserved under those 
centralized systems, to which they were profusely con- 
tributing their wealth and their numbers. The increas- 
ing complications of sect along all the frontier made 
hundreds of enlightened men feel the preciousness of 
that spirit of catholicity which they had learned in the 
bosom of Congregationalism, and the urgent necessity 
of returning to the simple polity of their fathers, that 
they might conserve that spirit, and transmit it to their 
children after them. 

Another proof that Congregationalism has cultivated 
a catholic spirit is found in the fact, that intelligent 
Congregationalists are seldom apologists for sect. It 
is remarkable that the two religious organizations of 
Protestantism that are most widely separated from 
each other in their organic principles, most resemble 
each other in their disapprobation of sectarian divisions, 
and their attachment to a catholic unity of the church. 
It is true indeed that the catholicity of the one is official 
and organic, and that of the other inorganic and spir- 
itual ; but both Congregationalists and Episcopalians 



CONGREGATIONALISM. 37 1 

believe in the oneness of the Christian church, and 
pray for its realization, and are very seldom found apol- 
ogizing for the present divided and distracted condition 
of Christendom. The adherents of other Protestant 
organizations very generally claim, that no platform of 
the church is found in the New Testament, and that 
its constitution is left to be decided by the taste and 
judgment of the Lord's people. If this is so, it follows 
of course that the present divided condition of the 
Christian world is normal, and accordant with the plan 
of the Founder of the church, and is to be perpetual. 
It is surely not strange that persons who hold this view 
of the subject should seek to convince themselves and 
others, that Jesus Christ acted wisely in thus opening 
all the floodgates of sect, and that the present sectarian 
condition of the church is as wise and beneficent as it 
is inevitable. Persons who hold this view are sectarians 
from principle. They are compelled to believe that 
Jesus Christ was a sectarian, that he founded his 
church on sectarian principles, and that he meant that 
it should be divided into sects, through all the cycles 
of time. 

Such men may believe in a moral and spiritual cath- 
olicity, but it is a catholicity which is contradicted by 
all the arrangements of the church militant, and is 
destined never to be manifested in this world, except 
in such occasional acts of fraternity as may be found 
possible in the midst of the perpetual rivalries of dis- 
tinct church governments, each endeavoring to. exercise 
jurisdiction over the greatest possible numbers. Con- 
gregationalism creates no logical necessity of defending 
this view of the subject. It maintains no modes of 
organization which are not accordant with the examples 
furnished by the New Testament, or which are in spirit 
contradictory to catholicity. There is no logical reason 



372 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

why a Congregationafist should not believe in the Holy- 
Catholic Church, and pray and hopefully labor for its 
realization in this world. It is for this reason doubt- 
less, that Congregationalism has always tended to a 
larger catholicity than the other Protestant sects, larger 
than Anglicanism ; for that has no conception of any 
catholicity except that which is comprehended within 
its own organization, while Congregationalism is com- 
prehensive of all the disciples of Christ. The careful 
study of this subject will easily teach us, that the organic 
principles under which we live exert great influence in 
the formation of character. 

The church principles advocated in this book call for 
no change in the external organization of the Congre- 
gational churches, except in one particular, and in rela- 
tion to that we shall all be agreed. The system has 
not hitherto entirely avoided tendencies to local schism. 
Two or more churches are often organized in the same 
community, in circumstances in which they cannot but 
be rivals to each other, rather than mutual helpers of a 
common interest. They often result from personal feel- 
ings orpassions. They are sometimes produced by di- 
versities of opinion in respect to matters confessedly of 
minor importance, and sometimes altogether local and 
temporary in their character. Congregationalism is no 
more chargeable with a tendency to such agitations and 
divisions than other forms of Protestantism. Perhaps 
it would not be difficult to show that it is even less so. 
But it must be admitted, that it is not free from such a 
tendency, and that it has not hitherto successfully 
resisted it. This is an evil which has been more or 
less prevalent under all forms of religious organization, 
and which can only be remedied by more deeply imbu- 
ing the whole multitude of the disciples with Christian 
principles and the spirit of the Master. A local church 



CONGREGATIONALISM. 373 

should never be divided except from an upright and 
dispassionate conviction that the general good requires 
it. Two churches should never be planted in such 
circumstances, that they will be in any proper sense the 
rivals of each other. New churches ought not to be 
organized except with the approbation of the whole 
Christian community affected by them. When increased 
accommodations are needed, it is often better to pro- 
vide them by erecting larger church edifices than by 
multiplying church organizations. Churches ought to 
be separated from each other, as far as possible, not by 
personal affinities or the lines which divide social classes, 
but by strictly geographical boundaries. The spirit of 
the gospel pre-eminently requires that the high and the 
low, the rich and the poor, the learned and the igno- 
rant should meet together in the worship of God, and 
devoutly acknowledge the Lord as the maker of them 
all. In this respect Congregationalism ought to be 
much more thoroughly controlled by its own funda- 
mental principles than it is. It ought much more 
earnestly to avoid local divisions, and to make more 
use of geographical lines in defining the boundaries of 
churches than it has hitherto done. Sect is utterly 
regardless of such lines in its organic arrangements. 
It is, for the most part, considerate only of the means 
of making the greatest possible number of proselytes 
to itself ; and when it has free course, will erect all the 
churches for a city of twenty thousand people, within 
the circuit of a few rods, on the same principles of 
competition by which all the banks of such a city are 
generally found in close proximity to each other. I 
can never look at the situation of churches in relation 
to each other in towns and cities without a sense of 
humiliation and shame. It reveals the fact, that Chris- 
tians are in the habit of deciding questions of the 



374 THE KEYS 0F sect. 

gravest practical importance from a regard to the inter- 
ests of rival churches, and not to the general good. 
The fact is disgraceful to our common Christianity. 
Congregationalists have the means of avoiding this 
evil, and they should use them. 

The doctrines of this book do require one change in 
the internal economy of Congregationalism, and only 
one of any fundamental importance. Our historical 
Congregationalism has held to the power of the keys 
as tenaciously as other Protestant organizations ; and, 
as it has earnestly believed in the duty of preserving 
the purity of the church by diligent and faithful disci- 
pline, it has applied that power more zealously and 
more conspicuously than any other Protestant organiza- 
tion. If I am right in my conclusions, it is of essential 
importance that Congregational churches should greatly 
modify their discipline, both in theory and practice. 
Their theory of a network of independent local churches 
covering states, nations and the whole world, not the 
rivals but the helpers of each other, and united together 
as a world-wide fraternity of faith and love, is truly 
apostolic. It antedates the boasted ancient forms of 
Christian organizations, the papal church, the Nicene 
church, the clergy in three orders ; the first link of its 
chain of succession is securely held in apostolic hands. 
But it has need to unlearn one bad lesson which was 
taught it by the hard task-master to which the church 
was so long enslaved. It has need to unlearn the false 
interpretation of our Lord's prediction in respect to 
Peter, which has been tenaciously adhered to through 
more than fifteen centuries of spiritual despotism in 
the church of God, and to return to that spiritual nur- 
ture which Jesus provided for his people in all genera- 
tions. 

There are peculiar and urgent reasons why Congre- 



CONGREGATIONALISM. 375 

gationalists should make haste to abandon that errone- 
ous conception of discipline, which has been pointed 
out in previous chapters, and adopt that moral disci- 
pline which Jesus inculcated. No form of Protestantism 
has been so seriously in earnest to make a faithful 
application of church discipline as Congregationalism. 
On the other hand, if true church discipline really means 
the power of the keys, no other Protestant organization is 
so ill adapted to its successful application. The power 
of the keys converts the body that holds it into a judi- 
cial tribunal, an ecclesiastical court charged with the 
duty of trying, convicting and punishing the guilty. If 
. Congregationalism recognizes the power of the keys at 
all, it places it in the hands of the. brotherhood of the 
local church, and thus constitutes it a judicial tribunal. 
All history shows that the worst possible arrangement 
of the judicial power is to commit it to a popular 
assembly. Whatever else popular assemblies may be 
fitted to do, they are not fitted to perform the judicial 
function. Yet in the three hundred years of the his- 
tory of the Congregational churches of modern times, 
they have been performing this function. That they 
have performed it so well, and maintained so high a 
degree of unity, prosperity and spiritual power, while 
bearing a burden to which their constitution is so ill 
adapted, is marvellous indeed, and proves the excellence 
of the system as a whole. 

The history of Congregational church disciple, if it 
were justly written, might not always be pleasant read- 
ing, but, in its relations to the subject we are consider- 
ing, could not but be interesting and important. It 
would prove that those churches have produced in 
large masses of human beings a disinterested love of 
righteousness, a power of self-control, a successful moral 
culture, which never have been surpassed under any 



376 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

other system. Yet the proofs are numerous, that its 
prosperity and spiritual power have been greatly hin- 
dered by the exercise of the judicial function under 
circumstances peculiarly difficult and embarrassing. 
The conduct of any case of judicial discipline, unless it 
is one of flagrant crime, in respect to which the evidence 
is so clear as to leave no possible room for divided 
opinion, is almost sure to divide the church into parties 
more or less embittered against each other, and to 
inflict wounds which can only be healed by time, and 
imperfectly at the best. The pastor is apt to find great 
difficulty in satisfying both parties of his impartiality, 
and is therefore very likely to become unacceptable to 
one or the other. The community outside of the church 
takes sides, the majority often being opposed to the 
action which is finally adopted by the church, and 
therefore alienated from it. It is impossible to decide 
to what extent the discipline of these churches may 
have been influential in producing that alienation from 
them, which notoriously exists at the present time in 
the irreligious masses that surround them. 

It would also be a very curious chapter in the history 
of the Congregational churches of New England, which 
should truly exhibit the influence which their discipline 
has exerted, in inducing portions of the people to seek 
connection with other forms of religious organization, 
and thus introducing sectarian divisions, which in 
former times were almost unknown. The time is within 
my own memory, when very many of the country towns 
of New England knew almost nothing of a division of 
sects. How widely that state of things must have 
differed from the present is quite obvious to all well- 
informed persons. I do not believe it possible success- 
fully to deny, that the divisions, the alienations, the 
heart-burnings, the bitter animosities which have been 



CONGREGATIONALISM. 377 

produced by frequently occurring cases of discipline 
conducted on judicial principles have had very large 
influence in facilitating the introduction of the other 
forms of religious organization, which now divide the 
people. No people can witness the frequent occurrence 
of judicial investigations conducted by popular assem- 
blies, either civil or ecclesiastical, without disgust. 
What has taken place in this respect was what must 
have taken place anywhere, human nature remaining 
the same. If it can be shown that Jesus Christ has 
constituted the brotherhood of every local church an 
ecclesiastical court, bound to hear charges, to subject 
them to a judicial trial, to acquit or to convict and 
condemn, and to pronounce the sentence of exclusion 
from the table of the Lord on the impenitent guilty, 
then let them gird themselves for the work in the 
strength of the Lord, encouraged by the experience of 
three hundred years, that they can perform this difficult 
task and yet retain a degree of spiritual prosperity 
unsurpassed by any religious body. But if, as w r e have 
shown, the Lord has never laid any such burden on 
the local church, let her cease to usurp it ; and gladly 
undertake in its stead that kindly moral and spiritual 
culture of the whole brotherhood which our Lord 
enjoins. 

It has already been noticed in another chapter, that 
at the present time the discipline of the churches has 
passed into neglect and disuse. Good men deplore 
this with deep sorrow, and well they may. But they 
can never return again to such discipline as has existed 
in the past. Discipline the churches must have, or 
cease to be the churches of Jesus Christ. But it never 
can be the discipline of the court-room, the judicial 
tribunal any more. It must be that moral culture 
which is proper to a loving Christian household, and 



378 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

not the cold, hard contest of what men call a court of 
justice. Will the reader pardon me ? I was a member 
of the church from early years. I saw much of church 
discipline in my youth. No language I am now able to 
command can adequately express the moral agony I 
experienced in my tender years in witnessing the 
progress of those processes. The church in which 
most of them occurred was then in its infancy on the 
frontier. It is now strong in its noble maturity. But 
we may be sure it received and inflicted wounds in 
those struggles, which I still remember with deep sor- 
row. They might have been avoided, and would have 
been, if we had understood the way of God more per- 
fectly. 

I have here represented the peculiar difficulties of a 
judicial church discipline, as it exists in Congregational 
churches. Let it not however be supposed that it 
encounters no difficulties under other ecclesiastical 
systems. It is not appropriate to point out those diffi- 
culties in this place. It is only necessary to remark 
here, that under some ecclesiastical systems they are 
avoided by neglecting discipline altogether, or at least 
by substituting for the fraternal fidelity of all the mem- 
bers the oversight of the clergy. Under other systems, 
where there has been an effort to maintain discipline in 
its purity, it has been found to involve difficulties of 
another character indeed, but not less serious than 
those which are experienced in connection with Con- 
gregationalism. 

Congregational churches have always been deeply in 
earnest to preserve the Christian faith in its purity. I 
am well aware that many persons can at present be 
found, to whom this seems the very thing which is most 
amiss in their past history. In their zeal for what they 
call liberality, such persons assume that it is really of 



CONGREGATIONALISM. 379 

no consequence, that even the church of Christ should 
stand by any system of faith at all, and the fact that 
any religious body zealously endeavors to maintain any 
system of doctrine is conclusive proof of bigotry. I am 
quite unable to agree with them. It is the height of 
absurdity to apply the name Christian to any man or 
any body of men that does not believe in the Christ of 
the New Testament, the Christ of God. The whole 
characteristic influence of Christianity in the world has 
been exerted by that gospel which Paul says he preached 
to the Corinthians. 1 No man justly incurs the charge 
of bigotry, because he holds fast to the truth. The 
man who lays claim to the credit of " liberality," because 
he holds fast to nothing, is guilty of both absurdity and 
arrogance. They only are "liberal" who "prove all 
things," and "hold fast to that which is good." But 
it is not necessary to maintain that Congregationalists 
have always been wise in the methods which they have 
adopted for conserving the truth as it is in Jesus. To 
one sound principle however they have always adhered, 
— that in admitting persons to membership in the local 
church, they are to receive with cordial welcome all 
true disciples of Christ. They have believed, and 
rightly, that faith is an element of character, and that 
therefore, in estimating character, the relations of the 
mind to evangelic truth are certainly to be taken into 
the account. They have always believed that it is 
absurd to welcome to the household of faith persons 
who do not believe in Christ. As has already been 
remarked, the early Congregational churches judged 
of the soundness of the faith of candidates for admis- 
sion by their own personal confessions. The young, 
the inexperienced, the unlearned expressed their faith 

1 i Cor. xv : 1-8. 



380 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

in Christ by such few and simple words as they were 
able understanding^ to employ. Persons of more 
experience, intelligence and culture were expected to 
give fuller expression in their own language to their 
views of the gospel. 

At a later period in their history, the plan was adopted, 
and to a great extent is still retained, of requiring each 
candidate for admission to the church to give public 
and solemn assent to a prescribed formulary of doctrine, 
recognized as the creed of the church. This was not 
regarded as inconsistent with the fundamental principle 
already stated, — that all true disciples are to be wel- 
comed to membership in the local church. It is true these 
creeds often went into considerable detail as to points 
of doctrine, and embraced many of the points at issue 
in the theological controversies of modern times. But 
they were intended only to embrace so much of evan- 
gelic truth as any true disciple might be expected will- 
ingly to subscribe to. I am unable to believe that this 
change in the original practice of the churches was an 
improvement. It would be difficult to show either that 
many of the creeds of Congregational churches do not 
contain phraseology which the young, the inexperienced 
and the uncultivated cannot be expected to comprehend 
the meaning of, or that they do not frequently require 
the candidate to assent to propositions which many 
even enlightened Christians do not believe. I certainly 
can speak from experience, that the duty of propound- 
ing articles of faith for the public solemn assent of 
persons who obviously cannot understand their mean- 
ing, or judge of their correctness, is not a pleasant 
duty to perform. It is sometimes a very painful one. 
Neither does it tend to conserve the doctrinal purity of 
the church. One cannot be made to believe a proposi- 
tion by giving his assent to it when he does not under- 



CONGREGATIONALISM. 16 1 

stand its meaning. A proposition may just as well be 
propounded to a candidate in a foreign language of 
which he does not understand a word, as in an English 
dress the meaning of which he is equally unable to 
understand. We blame, Rome for offering her public 
prayers. in an unknown tongue. We should beware of 
falling into the same error, by requiring the young and 
the uncultivated to give assent to a form of words 
which is to them unintelligible. 

Our Presbyterian friends manage this matter much 
more wisely, except where they have borrowed this 
objectionable custom of their Congregational neighbors. 
I believe they never have borrowed it, except in 
churches made up of Congregational elements, and 
afterwards worked over into Presbyterianism, but still 
retaining this one feature of their Congregational line- 
age. In unadulterated Presbyterianism, chief reliance 
is had on the elders to judge of the fitness of applicants 
for membership. They do not test the doctrinal sound- 
ness of the candidate by requiring subscription or 
assent to a prescribed formulary of doctrine, but by 
personal intercourse with each individual, precisely 
according to the custom of the early Congregational 
churches. In another respect however they might 
borrow wisdom from the Congregational churches. 
With them the judgment of the eldership is final. The 
Congregational practice fully recognizes the autonomy 
of the brotherhood. No matter in what manner the 
fitness of the candidates may have been inquired into, 
the names of candidates for admission are first publicly 
read before the congregation, and time is allowed for 
objections to be made j after which, no objections hav- 
ing been made, they are admitted on public profession 
of their faith in Christ, by the act of the whole .mem- 
bership of the church. This procedure is eminently 



382 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

fraternal, and might be imitated by all other churches 
with great advantage. 

The use made by the Presbyterian churches of the 
Calvinistic formularies of doctrine of the seventeenth 
century, for guarding themselves against the encroach- 
ments of error was remarked upon in a former chapter, 
and shown to be ineffectual and inexpedient. It is 
claimed in certain quarters towards which I am accus- 
tomed to look with very respectful deference, that what 
is called the fellowship of the Congregational churches 
is so constituted, as to place those churches in nearly 
the same relations to those formularies in which Pres- 
byterians stand. It is true that no Congregational 
minister is required at his ordination to affirm his 
assent to those confessions. The question will not 
even be asked him whether he has ever read any of 
them. It is not improbable that at the time of his 
ordination he had not. Yet it is claimed that the fel- 
lowship of the churches recognizes them as its basis, 
and that every Congregational minister is under an 
implied obligation, which is no less imperative because 
it is only implied, not to assist in ordaining or installing 
in the pastoral office any one who is not in substantial 
agreement with those formularies. If this is a true 
interpretation of the system of Congregational fellow- 
ship, that system is certainly open to grave criticism. 
If every Congregational pastor really owes such a moral 
obligation, for example to the Savoy confession, then 
that obligation ought to be recognized and made con- 
spicuous in the public proceedings of every ordination 
and installation. That would be fair, honest and 
straightforward ; we should understand one another, 
and the world would understand us. In our present 
forms of procedure in such cases, no such impression 
is made. Men enter into the Congregational ministry 



CONGREGATIONALISM. 383 

and become pastors of churches, without ever suspecting 
that they are assuming any such obligations ; and never 
become aware that they have assumed them, till they 
are informed of it by their venerable fathers in the 
riiinistry, long after those transactions are passed. If 
it is true that one owes a moral allegiance to any such 
formulary of doctrine in virtue of the fact that he re- 
ceives Congregational ordination, or accepts the pastoral 
office in a Congregational church, that fact should 
appear in the transaction itself. The candidate should 
be required solemnly to recognize that obligation. The 
proceedings of ordaining and installing councils remain- 
ing as they are, and since the days of the fathers have 
been, it is very solemnly impressed on the candidate's 
mind, that he is bound to stand firmly by the whole 
gospel of Christ ; but it is in no way suggested to him, 
that he is bound by any post-apostolic interpretation of 
Christian doctrine. 

Would the churches be willing to make such an 
innovation upon the usages of our fathers ? Would the 
good and venerable men who are arguing for such an 
interpretation of our system themselves be willing to 
propose such an innovation ? Can they then deny, that 
if this is what we mean, we ought to make ourselves 
understood, by speaking and acting accordingly ? Noth- 
ing can well be more absurd than the idea of main- 
taining unimpaired from generation to generation the 
allegiance of all ministers and churches to those formu- 
laries, by our recognized methods of procedure. If in 
this matter we mean just what the Presbyterian churches 
mean, let us adopt the same straightforward and sensi- 
ble mode of expressing it. Is it not legitimate to argue, 
that if our fathers had so meant, they would have adopted 
forms and modes of procedure more expressive of their 
meaning ? Is not the true reason why we are not willing 



384 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

to make such an innovation as that above suggested, 
that we do after all mean to recognize the supreme 
obligation of abiding by the gospel as it has come clown 
to us from the lips of Jesus, through his own chosen 
witnesses, and that we do not mean to recognize any 
allegiance to any other standard ? This is what I have 
always understood by Congregationalism. Is it not 
absurd and preposterous at this stage in our history, to 
claim that we are bound by any other authorities, or 
that we are bound by any authorities as Congregational- 
ists, by which we are not bound as Christians ? 

If it is suggested, that according to this interpretation 
of our system, we have no fixed standard of faith, and 
are liable to drift no one knows where, the reply at 
once occurs to us, that this is only affirming that the 
Christianity of the Bible is not a fixed, definite and 
intelligible system of thought ; that the Bible may mean 
anything which any one pleases to make it mean. This 
surely is not sound Congregational doctrine. It was 
the faith of our fathers, and it is our faith, that the 
Bible is an intelligible book, and that the human mind 
is capable of interpreting and understanding it. If 
there is any doctrine in respect to which Congregation- 
alists are perfectly unanimous, it is this. It is there- 
fore in the last degree absurd and preposterous for us 
to say, that to recognize the Scriptures as our only 
standard of faith is to deprive us of any fixed system 
of religious thought, to be driven we know not whither 
by all the winds and currents of capricious opinion. 
When we permit ourselves to speak thus of the Bible, 
we are untrue to one of the most sacred articles in the 
faith of our fathers. Neither they nor we have ever 
held any such estimate of the Scriptures. 

Another answer is also obvious. We all do admit, 
that no formulary of doctrine can have any authority 



CONGREGATIONALISM. 385 

other than its agreement with the word of God. From 
every such standard there is always an appeal to the 
Scriptures, and to the mind of God however made 
known. We cannot therefore protect ourselves from 
the drifting currents of opinion, by making ourselves 
fast to a prescribed formulary. We cannot make our- 
selves fast to it, for we know in the very attempt, that 
it is not. infallible, and that we ourselves may yet dis- 
cover that it is erroneous. Such formularies of doc- 
trine are not, as men suppose, rocks in the stream of 
human thought. Language changes its meaning. Men 
continue to use the same language, while their thinking 
undergoes radical revolution. Of the abstract and 
technical language of the formularies of doctrine this 
is pre-eminently true. Of the language of common life, 
of the concrete forms which the imagination employs, 
of the pictures which she draws, it is not true. They 
are as permanent and changeless as the creations of 
the pencil and the chisel. If we honestly determine to 
hold fast to the word of God, we shall not drift. We 
shall be at the mercy of the winds and waves no more. 
We shall have made ourselves fast to the changeless 
realities of the moral universe. But the attempt to resist 
the influence of opinion by erecting any statement of 
doctrine into a standard of faith is as hopeless as the 
attempt to protect a vessel against the influence of the 
current by making it fast to another vessel which is 
borne along upon the bosom of the same stream. 

If, as we believe, the Scriptures contain a revelation 
from God of those great spiritual realities, the knowl- 
edge of which is necessary to the attainment of our des- 
tiny, then to stand fast by those realities is to secure 
for ourselves and for all who stand with us all the pro- 
tection against changing currents of opinion, and all the 
permanency of religious thought, which are either pos- 
25 



386 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

sible or desirable. But to attempt to obtain such 
security for our system by erecting into a standard, by 
which men are to estimate the soundness of each other's 
faith, any confessedly fallible statement of doctrine, is 
no less hopeless than the effort to protect ourselves 
against motion by making fast to a moving body. 

It may be said that all Christian sects profess to hold 
fast to the Scriptures, and that if we recognize no other 
standard, there will be nothing to distinguish us from 
other bodies of Christians. Why do we wish to be dis- 
tinguished from other bodies of Christians ? What so 
desirable as that our sect should be merged in the great 
ocean of the one faith of the gospel ? Instead of 
regarding this as a calamity, we should recognize it as 
an end devoutly to be sought and prayed for. Eut 
unfortunately the allegation is not true. If we should 
have the wisdom and the grace to stand together, with 
no creed but the gospel, the whole gospel, and noth- 
ing but the gospel, there would still remain enough 
sadly to distinguish us as a peculiar people. On the 
one hand, our firm adherence to the truth as it is in 
Jesus would distinguish us from all who reject that 
truth • and on the other hand the shibboleths of sect 
so tenaciously retained by bodies of Christian disciples, 
who still insist on abiding by sectarian forms and stand- 
ards, would only too thoroughly separate between us 
and them. Our wisdom still would be to find out if 
possible the one position which we can and must 
occupy in steadfast fidelity to our Mastor, and lovingly 
invite our brethren of every name to stand with us on 
the one basis of a common faith in Jesus Christ, and 
thus patiently wait till the Holy Catholic church as 
Jesus conceived of it shall stand revealed before all the 
world. 

It seems necessary to speak a little of what is tech- 



CONGREGATIONALISM. 387 

nically called the fellowship of the churches. As there 
is at present not a little excited and partisan feeling on 
this subject, it would have been desirable to pass it by 
in silence. But the subject is too important to the work 
in hand to be altogether omitted in the discussion. The 
superficial reader of our literature is quite likely to fail 
to notice, that the technical meaning of these words 
differs widely from the meaning they would naturally 
suggest to one unacquainted with our history. To such 
a reader the phrase might naturally suggest that rela- 
tion of independent churches to one another, which 
Chevalier Bunsen and Archbishop Whately have shown 
to have really existed among the churches founded by 
the apostles. Whately's language is, " That, though 
the many churches founded by the apostles were 
branches of one so'ifituraZ brotherhood, — though there 
was ' one Lord, one faith, one baptism ' for all of them, 
yet they were each a distinct, independent community 
on earth, united by the common principles on which 
they were founded, and by their mutual agreement, 
affection and respect ; but not having any one head on 
earth, or acknowledging any sovereignty of one of the 
Societies over another." Bunsen's account of the mat- 
ter is substantially the same. There was a genuine 
fellowship between those churches. It was just such a 
fellowship as that which exists between individual good 
men everywhere. It was but a recognition of the 
natural and universal fraternity which binds all virtuous 
beings and communities together. It was a fellowship 
which no more limited the independence of the churches 
than the fellowship of individuals limits individual inde- 
pendence. Doubtless if my neighbor violates the laws 
of morality which should regulate the conduct of men 
to each other, my confidence in him will be impaired. 
I shall no longer trust him nor co-operate with him as 



388 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

before. The bond of moral confidence that bound us 
together is broken, and can only be restored by his 
repentance and return to the ways of virtue. 

Precisely the same thing will hold as between such 
independent churches. The confidence which each 
reposes in every other depends on their mutual fidelity 
to their common principles. No one church, nor any 
group of churches has any sovereignity over any other. 
In such a fellowship of independent Christian churches 
w r e all believe. In just so far as this is admitted to be 
a correct and complete statement of the relations in 
which Congregational churches stand to each other, no 
controversy can arise on the subject. The conception 
of such a network of independent churches, thus related 
to each other, covering nations and extending itself by 
the spiritual conquests of the gospel, till it shall cover 
the whole inhabited earth, is scriptural, practical, beauti- 
ful, grand, and by the grace of God may become actual. 
Will the reader pardon the egotism ? This is the Con- 
gregationalism with which I fell in love in the ardor of 
my youth, and my affection is not chilled by the frosts 
of age. No, it is the Holy Catholic church which 
apostles founded, and it has a moral grandeur, in com- 
parison with which the organic catholicity of the papal 
church and of all other churches is mean and contempt- 
ible. 

But there is a conception of the "fellowship of the 
churches " which is tenaciously held and zealously advo- 
cated by many whom I sincerely revere and honor, which, 
if I understand it, cannot be maintained consistently with 
the true conception of the church of Christ. Accord- 
ing to that understanding of the matter, the phrase 
describes a league existing among all Congregational 
churches, which constitutes those churches as truly an 
organized society under a centralized government, as 



CONGREGATIONALISM. 589 

any of the other Protestant sects. Its constitution and 
laws are not written in a code, but consist of a body of 
historic precedents, which are no less binding on the 
churches than the constitution of the Presbyterian 
church. They have no formally recognized creed, but 
the various acts of their synods and general councils 
are just as truly their standards, as the Westminster 
Comfession and Catechisms are the standards of the 
Presbyterian church in the United States. The decis- 
ions of councils are said to be advisory, not mandatory, 
and to have no force or validity "other than the reason- 
ableness thereof." But if a church to which the advice 
is given disregards such advice in practice, it incurs a 
liability of being called to account for its conduct before 
another council, and being by its decision ejected from 
the fellowship of the churches. It is certainly hard to 
distinguish between the right to give such advice, and 
the right to command. Such a right of sister churches 
to advise, and to call to account for not following their 
advice, is a real negation of the independence of the 
churches. In a controversy which unfortunately sprung 
up several years ago between Dr. now Bishop Hunting- 
ton and myself, certainly without any fault of mine, I 
said, " He who so holds the fellowship of the churches as 
to impair their independence, or so holds their indepen- 
, dence as to impair their fellowship, has yet to learn the 
A, B, C of Congregationalism." 

This could not now be said, without calling in ques- 
tion the intelligence of venerated men, who doubtless 
know a great deal more about Congregationalism than I 
do. As to the question what the system really is, I 
have no thought of setting my judgment against theirs, 
or of claiming to be an authority in the case. Let the 
recognized expounders of Congregational law decide 
that question. I shall not enter upon the discussion of 



390 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

it. I cannot however forebear remarking, that if the 
account above given of the fellowship of the churches is 
a true exposition of the matter, then our methods of 
procedure have great need of amendment. They are 
far better fitted to deceive than to convey a true idea of 
the spirit of our system. We seem to be giving advice 
when we are really issuing a command. We seem to 
have no standard of truth and righteousness but 
the word of God, while we really recognize another 
standard, which after all we confess not to be infalli- 
ble ; and yet we are liable to be ejected from fellow- 
ship for deviating from it. We seem to stand on 
the broad foundation which Jesus Christ himself has 
laid for the church universal ; and yet we as truly hem 
ourselves in by sectarian lines as any of our neighbors, 
by imposing on each other standards which Christ never 
imposed, and exercising authority over sister churches 
which he never gave us. If this is our meaning, we 
should make no delay in so altering our phraseology 
and our forms and methods of procedure, that they 
shall plainly express the real spirit of the system. As 
things are, we have no right to complain that many have 
accepted our system without being aware that it is liable 
to any such sectarian interpretation, honestly thinking 
in the simplicity of their hearts, that it is just what it 
seems to be, the independency, " the scriptural brother- 
hood of the churches founded by the apostles." It is 
not strange that multitudes have identified themselves 
with Congregationalism, who had no heart to select one 
out of the numerous rival sects of Christianity, but hon- 
estly meant to stand for life on the broad platform of 
the church universal, — the gospel, the whole gospel, 
and nothing but the gospel, — with no commitment to 
any sect whatever. If these persons have not under- 
stood Congregationalism correctly, let them be unde- 



CONGREGATIONALISM. 39 1 

ceived. Let that system define its position as a sect 
with a clearness which cannot be misunderstood, let it 
clothe itself in phraseology and forms and methods of 
procedure, which are appropriately expressive of its 
spirit and aims. It will then no longer attract those 
who are in harmony with Christ and the kingdom of 
God, but have no sympathy with it as a sect. For 
myself, 1 am far from believing that the great body of 
Congregationalists desire or would accept any such 
change of form and phraseology. From their hearts 
they wish to stand on that broad platform of catholicity, 
which the system, as expounded by the sainted Robinson, 
seems to mean. 

Had it been either necessary or useful thus to limit 
the independence of the churches, in order to maintain 
their fellowship in the gospel, the apostles would have 
perceived that necessity, and provided for it. No one 
can pretend that they have left behind them any trace 
of the existence of any such league of neighbor churches 
to exercise an oversight and limit the independent 
action of particular churches. The arrangement is 
entirely unsupported by any apostolic example. There 
is indeed abundant proof, that the primitive churches 
recognized the fraternal tie that bound them together, 
and sustained each other in all practicable ways by 
mutual sympathy and help. There can be no doubt 
that if any church had abandoned the faith and for- 
saken Christ, it would have dropped out of the fellow- 
ship. But it would have been accomplished without 
any organic action, by its losing the confidence of 
churches that remained faithful, and ceasing to co- 
operate with them in the work of the Lord, just as any 
individual man loses his position among virtuous men, 
by giving himself up to a vicious life. In either case 
the rupture of the fraternal tie would be natural and 



392 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

spontaneous, and not the result of a judicial investiga- 
tion and the decree of a court. 

It should be constantly borne in mind, that the first 
step of departure from the primitive pattern was the 
erection of the officers of the church into a clergy with 
priestly functions, exclusively empowered to bring the 
people near to God by dispensing to them baptism and 
the Lord's Supper. Then came the priesthood in three 
orders, the bishop alone being able to confer clerical 
powers by the laying on of his hands. Nothing can be 
clearer than that this was a departure from primitive 
usage. Then the limitation of the autonomy of the 
local church became inevitable and its ultimate destruc- 
tion certain. No church had more than one bishop. A 
bishop could only be ordained by two or more bishops. 
No church therefore could have a bishop without a 
convention of two or more bishops of sister churches. 
Such a convention having the exclusive power of placing 
bishops over particular churches would find ample 
occasions for interfering in the management of its 
affairs, limiting and in process of time destroying its 
independence. There can be no reasonable doubt, that 
by this process the autonomy of the churches was over- 
turned, and the centralized government of the church in 
later ages ultimately produced. Congregationalists 
would do well to bear these facts in mind, and shun 
those very processes by which the apostolic constitution 
of the church was subverted, and utterly lost for ages. 
There is no reason to think that like causes will not 
produce like effects in modern as in ancient times. Nor 
are there wanting indications before our eyes, that the 
same causes which overturned the independence of the 
primitive churches are working to a similar result now. 
If Congregational churches mean to maintain their 
independence, they must be jealous of causes which 



CONGREGATIONALISM. 393 

threaten its subversion. They must beware how they 
are drawn into bondage and ecclesiastical vassalage by 
any pleas of fellowship, or by any attempts to erect 
other standards of faith than the word cf God. They 
must dare reverently to study the apostolic testimony, 
and resolutely to abide by the results of such study, 
prosecuted in devout dependence on the promised aids 
of God's Spirit. On these conditions only can they 
hope permanently to abide on the foundation of apos- 
tles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the Chief 
Corner-Stone. Such Congregationalism can endure till 
the millennium, and abide through its blessed ages. 
Congregationalism as a sect must vanish away with all 
other sects. 



394 THE KEYS 0F SECT. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

THE CHURCH OF THE FUTURE. 

No forms of government are so sure to be developed 
logically as those which have to do with religion. Such 
governments always have to do with conscience, and 
conscience is a powerful auxiliary of logic. It is very 
true indeed that many persons have much to do with 
the management of religious affairs, who seem to have 
no conscience at all. But even such persons are always 
under the necessity of respecting the consciences of the 
people. When therefore a principle is adopted, there 
is a necessity that it should be logically applied, and 
that systems which are built upon it should be harmo- 
nious with it, and should carry it out to its just conse- 
quences. When we can be sure that we understand 
the principles upon which any ecclesiastical system is 
built, and know its history, we can be sure of its future 
development. If this is so, the present ecclesiastical 
condition of Christendom furnishes abundant material 
for profound and highly interesting study, and maybe 
studied with the hope of throwing much light on ques- 
tions which relate to the destiny of Christianity in com- 
ing ages. It is not absurd to raise the question even 
now, What is to be the destiny of the church of Christ 
in the future history of this world ? 

Enterprising and thoughtful minds cannot help study- 
ing that question, and trying to predict what are to be 



THE CHURCH OF THE FUTURE. 395 

the future phases and aspects of religious thought and 
civilization as the astronomer foretells the phenomena 
of the starry heavens in coming ages ; or as the states- 
man seeks to forecast the destiny of states and nations, 
and of monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy. Many 
minds busy themselves in greater or less degree with 
such speculations. They are not to be blamed for it. 
A generous and active mind that believes in the per- 
petuity of the Christian religion and the church of God, 
must be profoundly interested in such inquiries. It 
must however be acknowledged, that the results which 
have hitherto been achieved in this field of inquiry are 
not sufficiently uniform, to warrant the belief that the 
principles on which such inquiries are to be conducted 
are settled and well understood. It is very difficult for 
any one sufficiently to emancipate himself from the 
prejudices of his own sect, and his education, to survey 
the future with an impartial judgment. Ages elapsed 
before astronomy could escape from the assumption, 
that this little planet which we inhabit is the centre of 
the universe, perpetually at rest, while the solar system 
and the starry heavens revolve around it. Any progress 
in astronomical knowledge was impossible, till this 
obstinate prejudice had been conquered. We all en- 
counter the danger of utterly failing in our efforts to 
understand the present condition of the world in respect 
to religion, and to forecast its future, by a similar over- 
estimate of the relative importance of a narrow and 
limited social system in which our own lives are passed. 
That order of things in which we ourselves are living 
seems to us as fixed and motionless, as the solid earth 
did to the ancient astronomers, while everything around 
us seems to be in motion. 

The zealous Romanist confidently affirms that the 
Reformation was a huge blunder, that three hundred 



396 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

years of experience have demonstrated that Protestant- 
ism is a failure, destined soon to pass away, and that 
all true Christian people must soon return to the 
bosom of the papal church, and find that repose under 
the sheltering wing of its authority which Protestantism 
can never afford. They are quite confident that what 
Protestants call the spiritual despotism of the papal 
church is only the social order which God has estab- 
lished, without which history can only be a miserable 
alternation of anarchy and secular despotism. Such 
men exhort us with a fervid eloquence, which they 
would have us mistake for prophetic inspiration, to take 
refuge in the papal church as the only ark of safety. 
Such retrogressive reformers will find their exhortations 
have very little power over enlightened minds, till by 
some process or other the history of the last eighteen 
centuries can be blotted out. Men will persist in hop- 
ing that something better is in store for humanity than 
can be looked for in retracing our steps to the gloomy 
ages of papal supremacy. Such persons forget too that 
history never moves backward. 

Another class of thinkers are equally confident that, 
as religious liberty is doubtless to be the future condi- 
tion of religious society, and no two minds can ever be 
expected to view such a subject as religion in exactly 
the same manner, that diversity of religious sects, which 
has come in upon the world with Protestantism and 
religious liberty, is to be characteristic of all the ages of 
the future • and that the progress of the truth in the 
world is to be accomplished by such a conflict of oppos- 
ing sects, as our fathers before us have witnessed, and 
we ourselves are witnessing ; that by these antagonisms, 
sects are destined to be perpetually "learning, but never 
able to come to the knowledge of the truth." Such 
men seem to suppose that human society is a scene of 



THE CHURCH OF THE FUTURE. 397 

perpetual progress with no destination, of perpetual 
activity and agitation with no achievement and no point 
of rest, a perpetual struggle and conflict for that which 
is never to be attained. 

In the midst of this scene of chaotic opinion, the 
track of thought over which we have passed in the 
progress of this work seems to suggest one aspect of 
the subject, in respect to which even minds occupying 
positions at the opposite poles of the religious world 
may be agreed. The future of this world's history in 
respect to religion presents but a single alternative. I 
speak now only of the aspects which the subject presents 
to those who believe that Christianity is true, and that 
the church of Christ is to be perpetual. I have nothing 
now to say of the sickly dream of those who would have 
us believe that humanity has outgrown religion, that we 
have entered on a stage of human progress, in which 
enlightened men can no longer believe in a personal 
God, or in the continued existence of human personality 
after the extinction of the body, and that in the future 
of human history there is to be no foundation for faith 
or devotion, or for any real recognition of moral obliga- 
tion or accountability. Much learning in one limited 
field of human knowledge hath made such men mad. 
They have studied themselves into profound ignorance 
of what it is infinitely important to man to know, — 
ignorance of a science which underlies and comprehends 
all the science which they know, — ignorance of a science 
of a personal God and personal humanity. The subject 
of which I am treating lies wholly in that region of 
human thought where a personal reigning God is recog- 
nized, and religion is seen to be a permanent factor in 
human civilization. In that region of thought the 
permanency of Christianity and the Christian church is 
readily admitted. 



398 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

Well-informed persons believing in the truth and 
divine origin of Christianity will have no difficulty 
in being agreed, that Jesus Christ founded a church 
universal. It is true, that neither he nor the apos- 
tles seem to have used the phrase " Holy Catholic 
Church " ; but those words seem admirably fitted to 
express what Jesus had in his mind, when he said, " on 
this rock will I build my church, and the gates of hell 
shall not prevail against it." The idea of the catholic 
church was his own, and not an invention of after-times. 
Of the sort of catholicity which he intended, there are 
two' and only two possible conceptions. One of these 
conceptions is that of an organic and official catholicity 
under the government of a succession of bishops, begin- 
ning with the apostles and extending to the consumma- 
tion of all things. It seems to me that no well-informed 
man will deny, that this conception of catholicity is of 
very early origin in the Christian church • for example, 
that it existed in the mind of Cyprian who suffered 
martyrdom in 258 A. D. 

The other conception of catholicity is purely inor- 
ganic, of a universal fraternity the uniting bond of 
which is the consciousness of a common faith, common 
principles, a common aim and a common hope. This 
church universal is made visible to the world, and its 
boundaries are defined to its own members, by the 
badges of baptism and the Lord's Supper, and by that 
faith and those principles which have been handed 
clown to us by the testimony of the " twelve apostles of 
the Lamb." This Holy Catholic Church has no priest- 
hood but that of the one High-Priest who is passed 
into the heavens. It has no head, except the one Head 
the Christ who ever sitteth on the right hand of God. 
It is a kingdom of God, not of this world. It has no 
administration, no legislative, executive or judicial 



THE CHURCH OF THE FUTURE. 399 

officials among men. Jesus Christ himself is its only 
ruler, lawgiver and judge. Membership in it is obtained 
only by being born of the Spirit, and can be conferred 
by no act or authority vested in human hands. All 
who are born of the Spirit are members of it in the 
eye of God, and by the gift of Jesus Christ himself are 
entitled to all its privileges. 

No third conception of the catholicity of the church 
can be formed. We are under a necessity in forming 
our expectations of the future of Christendom, of mak- 
ing our choice between these two conceptions. One of 
them must be true, both cannot be. " Ye cannot serve 
God and mammon." They are diametrically opposed 
to each other. They are at the opposite poles of the 
moral universe. Whichever one of them is true, the 
other is false. Whichever one of them is Christian, 
the other is antichristian. Whichever one is of God, 
the other is a device of Satan. To one or the other of 
them the dominion of the future is appointed of God. 
When Cardinal Archbishop Manning asserts, (in sub- 
stance, I have not his words before me,) that God only 
is the Head and Ruler of the church, Papists and 
Protestants unite in hearty assent. When he asserts 
that the pope who rules to-day at Rome is the official 
successor of the apostle Peter, and, in virtue of that 
succession, is entitled to the homage and obedience of 
the whole church of God under heaven, as God's vice- 
gerent on earth, he asserts what is either true and 
imperatively binding on the conscience of all Christen- 
dom, or arrogantly and audaciously false, an impious 
attempt to exercise a hideous spiritual despotism over 
all the millions who are entitled to enjoy that moral 
and spiritual liberty wherewith Christ maketh his people 
free. The future destiny of Christendom is either sub- 
jection to that priestly hierarchy over which the pope 



4-00 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

assumes to rule in the name of God, or complete 
emancipation from all priestly mediation between God 
and man, except that of the one Mediator, and from 
all authority over the conscience except that of Christ 
and of God. 

The whole history ot Christendom through all its cen- 
turies is a succession of manifested tendencies toward 
one of these systems or the other. Nothing is, or ever 
has been, at rest. These are the two poles of the moral 
universe, and everything is in motion toward one or the 
other. In our attempts to forecast the future of Chris- 
tendom, the problem to be solved, when reduced to its 
simplest possible statement, may be thus enunciated, 
viz., To determine what forces now operating in the 
religious world tend toward the papal church and the 
universal supremacy of the pope, and what forces toward 
that spiritual catholicity which alone finds any counte- 
nance in the New Testament ; and which of these 
classes of forces is transient in its nature, and therefore 
destined to pass away ; and which of them is perma- 
nent, and has the prospect of acquiring universal do- 
minion. To solve this problem is to determine with 
certainty the constitution of the church of the future, 
and the character of that civilization which is to be the 
mature product of the influence of Christianity upon the 
world. 

As all Christian history indicates the existence of 
these two conceptions of the church standing in dia- 
metric opposition to each other, so there are two attrac- 
tive forces perpetually tending, the one toward one of 
these systems, and the other toward the other. On the 
one hand, the gospel of Christ, the doctrine which 
teaches the forgiveness of sins and the attainment of 
everlasting life through faith in Jesus Christ and such 
thorough reformation of life or repentance as that faith 



THE CHURCH OF THE FUTURE. 401 

is sure to produce, always has tended to bind all that 
embrace it into one universal spiritual fraternity, having 
no head but Christ, and no priesthood but the one High- 
Priest who has passed into the heavens, a kingdom of 
God which in the strictest sense is not of this world. 
Such certainly was that kingdom of heaven, on the 
glorious throne of which Jesus began to sit on the day 
of Pentecost, and under which the twelve apostles began 
to occupy their " twelve thrones, judging the twelve 
tribes of Israel." Local societies everywhere sprung up 
according to the social necessities of each Christian 
community. These local societies were of necessity 
organic, but they were also independent. There was no 
centralized organization exercising any controlling au- 
thority over them. The kingdom of heaven was a con- 
stantly enlarging, inorganic fraternity, the existence of 
which was manifested to the world by the use of two 
very simple external rites instituted by Christ himself 
for the free use of all his followers, and by the doctrines 
which the Christians taught and the pure lives which 
they lived. 

This is precisely the order of things towards which 
the preaching and the acceptance of evangelic doctrine 
tends. When the gospel is preached in single-hearted 
earnestness as on the day of Pentecost, and gladly 
received by multitudes, how vividly do all those con- 
verts feel that they are one in Christ ! They are 
strongly impelled to unite together in permanent social 
relations, to help each other's faith, and to co-operate 
in the work of the Lord. That process by which they 
are separated by the lines of rival sects and under 
various systems of church government is not a natural 
arrangement. It does not grow out of the occasion. 
Left to themselves, it is one of the last things they 
would ever have thought of. It meets no want of which 
26 



4-02 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

they are conscious. They adopt it, because they feel 
a desire to be permanently associated with Christian 
people, and finding them divided among these various 
forms and governments, they are reduced to the neces- 
sity of choosing for themselves that form of organization 
which best suits their prejudices or their tastes. But 
from the beginning it was not so. No such necessity 
was experienced by the converts of the apostles. " All 
ye are brethren," expressed one of the deepest senti- 
ments of their hearts, and that fraternity embraced the 
whole multitude of the disciples. It impelled to love 
and cherish them, to co-operate with them, but not to 
rule over them, or to be ruled over by them. 

The instrumentality by which they had received the 
word, and been persuaded to accept it, was a fraternal 
and not a priestly function. It was just such an office 
as they feel themselves to be irresistibly impelled to 
perform for every other man, whenever God gives them 
the opportunity. It is the office of loving persuasion. 
Such a convert feels that by the gospel of Christ the 
way has been completely opened to every man into the 
very holy of holies, and that all the human aid which 
any man can need is the persuasion of a brother to 
arise and enter in. Of the priestly office there can be 
no more need, for Jesus has completely performed it. 
That this is the natural influence of the preaching of 
the gospel no observant man would for one moment 
think of denying. Every earnest evangelic preacher 
knows it by constant experience. Every true convert 
feels it. Every Protestant community admits that it is 
so, whenever, for the sake of the greater efficiency of 
evangelic effort, it consents for the time being to cover 
sectarian distinctions as much as possible from view, 
and endeavors to combine the whole Christian commu- 
nity, however ordinarily divided up by sect lines, in a 



THE CHURCH OF THE FUTURE. 403 

purely Christian effort to persuade men to be recon- 
ciled to God. The adherents of the papal church itself 
constantly admit the same thing, by the zealous efforts 
they never fail to make, to dissuade their followers 
from listening to any preaching which teaches men, 
that the forgiveness of sins can be obtained by repent- 
ance and faith in Christ. The preacher who teaches 
that doctrine as Peter taught it on the day of Pentecost, 
or as Wesley and Whitefield taught it in the eighteenth 
century, is undermining all the foundations of the papal 
church, though he never speaks a word against it. Of 
this the Romish priesthood are perfectly aware, and 
never spare any pains to deter all "good Catholics" 
from listening to such preaching, by all the ghostly 
terrors with which "the church" arms them. 

So powerful is the tendency of all effort to propagate 
the gospel of repentance toward God and faith in our 
Lord Jesus Christ, to restore and build up that king- 
dom of God, that church universal which is delineated 
in. the New Testament, that we sometimes witness a 
manifestation of that kingdom, dispelling for the moment 
the clouds and darkness and confusion of modern sect, 
and appearing in glory before our eyes, like the vision 
which the Seer of Patmos saw of the New Jerusalem 
coming down out of heaven from God, adorned as a 
bride is adorned for her husband. With what fervid 
enthusiasm have millions of hearts been filled in read- 
ing of that ever-memorable communion season at the 
Madison Square Presbyterian Church, during the ses- 
sions of the Evangelical Alliance in the fall of 1873. 
In the joy inspired by that grand occasion, we could 
almost believe that the church had escaped at last from 
the wilderness, and crossed the Jordan into the prom- 
ised land. But how momentary ! It was only a glimpse 
of the " gate of the Celestial City " from the " Delectable 



404 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

Mountains." Those great and good men of many com- 
munions, in the barbarous patois of modern sect, only 
a few hours afterwards left those high places of the 
universal church of God, to return to that wilderness of 
practical sectarianism, from which they had only for a 
brief hour escaped, there to struggle and toil in weak- 
ness and sorrow till God shall call them home. One 
thing only was wanting to have made that scene per- 
fectly satisfactory to the longings of every devout soul. 
It was that on that holy mount of realized Christian 
brotherhood, they should have built a tabernacle for 
the whole church of God, into which she should enter 
and go no more out forever ; that the oneness of the 
Christian brotherhood should hereafter be as completely 
realized in all the details of Christian work and practi- 
cal beneficence, as in the holy fervors of that reunion 
of the dispersed tribes of Israel around the cross. 1 
Such manifestations of the blessed oneness of the Chris- 
tian brotherhood will not always be mere transient 
gleams of the spiritual kingdom of God, so soon swal- 
lowed up in surrounding darkness. They are true 
prophecies of the certain coining of the spiritual king- 
dom of God upon earth. They are precious foretastes of 
the glorious fruitage of the promised land, into which 
the Lord will erelong conduct his people. 

It is equally obvious that there is pervading Chris- 
tendom another force which perpetually attracts men 
towards a priestly hierarchy, and an organic and official 
catholicity. It is the assumption which has widely pre- 
vailed in the Christian church for so many ages, that 
the external rites of Christianity can only be accepta- 
bly observed under the corporate control of the church, 
and by the ministration of a clergy duly qualified by 

1 New Englander, Vol. XXXIII. page 566. 



THE CHURCH OF THE FUTURE. 405 

ordination, or in brief it is the ecclesiastical interpre- 
tation of the power of the keys. Wherever this is 
accepted in however limited or modified a form, it 
draws towards universal priestly hierarchy. Not only 
in all the churches which vie with the papal church 
in prelatical pretension, but through all the sects 
of Protestantism, wherever any modification of this 
principle is recognized, we are able to trace a beaten 
highway leading towards Rome, as the most perfect 
existing embodiment of priestly hierarchy. A Congre- 
gational church for example rejects the idea of an 
official succession from the apostles. It began its ex- 
istence by receiving baptism and the Lord's Supper 
from men on whom the hands of the bishop had never 
been laid, and without the slightest misgiving as to the 
propriety of so observing them. But in one particular 
the power of the keys was tenaciously retained. It is 
assumed that the church is very solemnly bound to 
guard by its corporate acts the external rites of Chris- 
tianity from being profaned by the participation of 
unworthy persons. For this purpose what is called the 
discipline of the church is exercised. The church 
becomes a court, intrusted with the high function of 
judicially investigating all charges against the moral 
conduct of its members, and depriving them, if found 
guilty, by a judicial sentence, of participation in these 
rites. If this judicial power exists at all in the church, 
in no other way can it be so infelicitously constituted. 

This conception of church discipline cannot be car- 
ried into execution with honest fidelity, without produ- 
cing heart-burnings, alienations, disaffection, disgust. 
One of two consequences will inevitably follow. Either 
on the one hand all discipline of the church will be 
neglected, and the church will become seemingly indif- 
ferent to the moral character of its members, and its 



406 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

moral reputation will deeply suffer, or on the other its 
life will be one of painful agitation and oft-recurring 
scenes of strife, which will make many of its members 
sick at heart, and ready to accept a church connection 
which affords a prospect of a more quiet and tranquil 
religious life. Such a prospect of tranquillity will seem 
to be presented to them by modes of organizing the 
church more hierarchal, and placing the power of the 
keys, not in the brotherhood, but in the hands of offi- 
cial persons by whom it will be exercised without any 
appeal to a popular assembly. Under such an organ- 
ization there always has been and there always will be 
a powerful tendency towards more aristocratic and hie- 
rarchal constitutions of the judicial power. Congrega- 
tionalists must abandon the exercise of such power, and 
rely on the moral forces of the gospel alone, or they 
cannot escape this tendency. They can guard the moral 
purity of their churches by the high moral power of the 
pulpit, and of the praying circle, and of the personal 
influence of their members over one another ; but if the 
power of the keys is to be retained as tenaciously in 
this as in any other organization, men will prefer some 
other mode of exercising it to the judicial action of a 
popular assembly. The moral forces which emanate 
from such preaching as that of the apostles will organ- 
ize independent churches only ; but if the church is to 
act as a judicial tribunal, that is one of the last modes 
of organization which will be likely to command the 
united suffrages of the Christian world. The power of 
the keys if adhered to will prove fatal to the indepen- 
dency of modern times, as its introduction into the early 
church certainly did destroy the Congregational auton- 
omy planted by the apostles. 

The exercise of the power of the keys through the 
brotherhood can never be an acceptable arrangement 



THE CHURCH OF THE FUTURE. 407 

to those persons of wisdom and virtue who must be 
intrusted with the oversight of the church in order that 
it may accomplish its ends. If a judicial church disci- 
pline is to be exercised in this manner, these persons 
must exert a very important influence over it, and have 
a most difficult task to perform. They must guide the 
judgments and in a great degree form the opinions of 
the multitude, and control their passions. The task 
will not only be a difficult, but a very painful one, and 
they must often have the mortification of perceiving, 
that they have helped the brotherhood to do imperfectly 
and badly that which they could themselves have done 
much more wisely and with much less trouble; and 
they will become disgusted with a system of things 
under which such experiences are liable to be often 
repeated. They will look with longing toward some 
constitution of the church, which will not expose them 
in the discharge of the duties of their office, to be 
thwarted by popular ignorance and the ebullitions of 
popular passion. In this manner the power of the keys 
tends directly to disgust those who have the oversight 
of the church with all attempts to govern it by the voice 
of the people, and to throw their entire influence in 
favor of the origination and enlargement of clerical 
power. Its practical working will create a clergy, by 
showing that a clergy is indispensable to its successful 
exercise. 

When thus a clergy has been once originated, it will 
constantly tend to the enlargement of its powers. The 
proof of this is abundant, both in early and in recent 
times. It is only necessary to refer to the history of 
the church to show that one change rapidly followed 
another, and that all changes were in the direction of 
an ever-growing priestly power ; and there is no end to 
this process, till the last possible development of priestly 



408 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

hierarchy has been attained. It is not enough to 
change the church of the apostles into the church of 
Hildebrand. That pope was more eager to grasp 
more power, and more successful in his efforts than 
any of his predecessors. Undoubtedly the papal church 
is the most complete development of priestly theocracy 
which has been attained in Christendom. In the Eastern 
church that development was always obstructed by the 
presence of imperial power. But it has encountered no 
such hindrance in the West, since the fall of the Western 
Empire. Yet the effort for further aggrandizement has 
not yet expended its force. It was reserved for the last 
pontificate to formulate and proclaim, by the authority 
of an ecumenical council, the dogma of the pope's 
infallibility. Toward this last and most complete 
development of priestly hierarchy all clerical power 
under all the organizations of .the Christian church is 
logically though not always consciously attracted, and 
the attraction is felt as truly under the most popular 
forms of polity, as under those that are more prelatical, 
provided only that the essential element of priestly 
ecclesiasticism is recognized. 

„ Under all the forms of Protestantism, there are many, 
both among the clergy and the laity, who are not at all 
conscious of any such attraction toward the papal hie- 
rarchy. It excites in them no sentiment but disgust 
and aversion. Their sympathies are with a free church, 
as the logical result of a pure gospel, and they clearly 
perceive that the papal hierarchy, and all the forms of 
the church that are in close affinity with it, are contra- 
dictory to the spirit of the gospel. Whatever may 
happen they will never move a step towards Rome ; 
for they know that Christ is not there. Yet they are 
ill at ease in the position they occupy. They are indis- 
tinctly conscious that all is not right, that there are 



THE CHURCH OF THE FUTURE. 409 

incongruities and unnatural antagonisms in the systems 
under which they live. They cannot advance in the 
direction of Rome, they dare not fall back upon the 
simple polity of the apostles. They have a vague 
apprehension that somehow the power of the keys must 
be exercised, the external rites of Christianity must be 
protected against profanation, by the exercise of ecclesi- 
astical power, and assume that in some way they were 
so protected in the apostolic churches, though the apos- 
tles have entirely failed to inform us of the fact, or to 
point out any method by which the power of the church 
is to be exerted for this purpose. No observant man 
can have failed to notice this unrest of devout Protestant 
minds. They are powerfully solicited by opposing 
forces, neither of which they feel at liberty to obey. 
Divest them of their intense sympathy with that gospel 
which proposes to save men by repentance toward God 
and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, and they will take 
up their line of march toward Rome. Eliminate from 
their minds all idea of governing the church by ecclesi- 
astical power, and they will stand in tranquillity and 
strength upon the platform of the apostles. These are 
the only points of rest. Nay, there is but one point of 
rest. The craving for ecclesiastical power knows no 
rest and permits none, any more than the love of money 
or the selfish greed of power. Rome is not at rest. 
She is ever grasping for some wider development of 
priestly hierarchy. 

In a simple faith in Christ as the Saviour of the 
world, and in the government of the church only by the 
power of the word and Spirit of God, there is rest and 
strength. Whenever the church of God will consent to 
make a solemn pause, and a brave and earnest effort 
to understand the kingdom of heaven as Jesus founded 
it, and conform all her arrangements and her whole 



41 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

social life to that standard, she will begin to know the 
peace of God which passeth knowledge, and to be 
strong in the Lord and the power of his might. Minis- 
ters of the gospel will be able to train their sons in all 
Christian learning without any fear that they will be 
drawn away by the seductive attractions of Rome. 
They will be working a system with which they are in 
hearty sympathy, and are prepared at all points ear- 
nestly to defend. How far this is from being at present 
true, they know best who have most deeply reflected on 
the passing scene. While I have been writing these 
pages, I have received a letter from an earnest Protest- 
ant minister, whose praise is in all the churches, in 
which he says, " I have often wondered how God can 
accomplish so much by a church that is off the track." 
A friend in the ministry has said to me, " I do not claim 
much for the church. I tell my friends that salvation 
is by Christ, and if they will consent to be for Christ, 
they can do nothing better as things are than join the 
church and co-operate with it as well as they can." If 
men will adopt that interpretation of the apostolic 
church which has been defended in these pages, they 
will have a church which will not be off the track, and 
for which they can claim much without any danger of 
failing to make good their claim. 

What then is to be the church of the future ? It 
surely will be either the last possible development of 
priestly hierarchy, the papal church with all its logical 
consequences, a perfected organic catholicity; or the 
church of the apostles, the church of which Jesus prom- 
ised that Peter should be a corner-stone, and that the 
gates of hell should never prevail against it, the spir- 
itual catholicity of faith and love. To which of these 
then does the empire of the future belong ? To answer 
this question, we have only to consider which of the 



THE CHURCH OF THE FUTURE. 411 

forces which are now exerting their influence on the 
religious world is transient and temporary, and which 
is in its own nature everlasting. If the power of the 
keys as it has been understood in church history could 
be shown to be a sound and valid interpretation of the 
words which our Lord addressed to Peter, if it could be 
shown that by the very institution of the Lord's Supper, 
and according to the clearly expressed intention of the 
Master, the church was intrusted with the perpetual 
keeping of that rite, to guard it against profanation by 
the participation of unworthy persons, if it could be 
made plain that that rite can only be exhibited to the 
people by a clergy qualified for the performance of that 
function by the laying on of the bishop's hands, if 
the testimony of the apostles which has come down to 
us showed that these things are true, or that any one 
of them is true, then I would relinquish the controversy 
without another struggle, and, however reluctantly, 
a.dmit that the extremest development of the papal 
hierarchy is to be the church of the future. 

Or if it could be shown that, though these things 
cannot be exactly proved by the extant testimony of the 
apostles, yet if it could be shown that the relation of 
the centuries immediately following the apostolic age to 
that age was such, that it could be reasonably inferred 
from the existence of certain constitutions and customs 
in those centuries, that the same must have existed in 
the apostolic age, then also I would admit that the 
preponderance of argument was in favor of priestly 
hierarchy, and that its extremest logical development 
is likely to be the prevailing form of the church in com- 
ing ages. But none of these things can be shown. 
The ecclesiastical interpretation of our Lord's words to 
Peter is a transparent delusion, supported by no exiget- 
ical reasons whatever. One blushes that it has influ- 



412 THE KEYS OF SECT. 

enced the church so long. The whole Biblical argu- 
ment for the power of the keys is incapable of bearing 
its own weight, much more of sustaining the huge struc- 
ture that is built upon it. The New Testament knows 
nothing at all of any necessity of a clerical or priestly 
function to the proper observance of baptism and the 
Lord's Supper. The inference that certain customs 
and constitutions which certainly did exist in the sec- 
ond and third centuries must have existed in the days 
of the apostles is utterly groundless and of no validity. 
There was every reason to expect that the progress of 
innovation would be rapid in the church as soon as 
the apostles were gone. It is as obvious that the 
church was greatly changed and corrupted between the 
times of Peter or Paul and the times of Tertullian and 
Cyprian, as it is that the Roman government and lan- 
guage were greatly changed and corrupted between the 
time of Cicero and that of Trajan. 

Yet the papal church must be supported by the 
authority of Jesus and the testimony of the apostles, or 
rest on no basis at all. So must all hierarchal, priestly 
and prelatical pretension. When a candid, impartial 
and scholarly criticism shall be applied to all the extant 
historic documents of the first three centuries of the 
Christian era, it will certainly be found, that none of 
these high-sounding pretensions can derive the slightest 
countenance from the authority of Christ or the apostles. 
The question of their future is reduced simply to this, 
— Can they maintain themselves through the ages of 
the future without any such support ? Devout Protest- 
ants will bring them to confront this state of the ques- 
tion without any possibility of escaping it, whenever 
they themselves will accept the polity of the New 
Testament as Jesus and the apostles left it. I shall 
soon pass away, and may not witness in the flesh the 



THE CHURCH OF THE FUTURE. 413 

fulfilment »of this prediction j but the time is very near 
when they will accept it, and when that time comes, 
confusion and dismay will pass over to the ranks of the 
legion advocates of hierarchal power. It cannot be 
perpetuated in an age of devout culture and sound 
historical criticism. 

On the other hand, the spiritual catholicity which 
rests for its only basis on the doctrine of forgiveness of 
sins through faith in Jesus Christ, and that thorough 
reformation of life which it is sure to produce, will 
endure forever. It fears no historical criticism. The 
life, the moral character and teachings of Jesus of 
Nazareth, his glorious superhuman insight of the pro- 
foundest moralities of human nature and of the uni- 
verse, his original unique conception of the kingdom of 
heaven, and his divine foresight of its destiny in the 
world, all combine with the resistless proof of his resur- 
rection from the dead, to give him a perpetually increas- 
ing influence over human society in its most cultivated 
ages. Faith in that Christ will produce reformation of 
moral character and purity of life. The multitudes 
who adopt it will become to a constantly increasing 
extent a world-wide fraternity, closely bound together 
by a common faith in Jesus Christ, and impelled by 
that spirit of universal philanthropy which was the 
characteristic of his whole career, to imitate him in a 
never-ceasing endeavor to save all that are lost. This, 

THIS is tO be THE CHURCH OF THE FUTURE. 



THE END. 



£7 



M 



r% 



■ 



